


All This Glitter and Dust

by Damalia (Achrya)



Series: A Pretty Rare Happiness [1]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Werewolf, Anal Sex, Arranged Marriage, Biting, Consent Issues, First Time, Hand Jobs, M/M, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Pack Dynamics, Pack Politics, Riding, Rough Sex, Scars, Scent Kink, Scent Marking, Sexism, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-15
Updated: 2016-04-17
Packaged: 2018-05-14 03:46:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 51,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5728453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Achrya/pseuds/Damalia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In a wolf pack there are rules, roles, and responsibilities that cannot be avoided.</p><p>Armin has always known his role was to give birth to the next pack leader, he'd just always assumed it'd be Eren he ended up with. But with an engagement to someone he's never met announced he's realizing that love might have to take a backseat to responsibility after all. </p><p>Jean has always chafed under the rules and expectations of the pack. When Marco, an alpha from the south who seems to have nothing but scars and secrets to his name, joins the pack he's drawn in. The deeper he falls the less sure he is that the things he sees in Marco, and in himself, are things he wants to explore.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Everything I'm Asking For But You

**Author's Note:**

> Pairings: Eren/Armin and Marco/Jean, background Mikasa/Connie/Sasaha. (Fight me.) Potential for Levi/Erwin. 
> 
> I swear this started as an idea for smutty ABO themed one shots. And then, suddenly, I was 15k words deep, Jean was putting his PoV all over things, Marco was butting into things that were supposed to be part of the Eremin story, and there were all these glimmers of actual plot. I just...couldn't win. 
> 
> There is a lot of...unpleasantness/unfairness associated with being an omega and, in particular, an omega of high status in this story (then again status in general seems to be a curse, Erwin isn't having a great time either). Arranged marriages and an expectation to breed as part of the responsibility to the pack and all that. So keep that in mind.

Jean scoffed openly, and loudly, at the idea of trying to aspire to uphold all of the 'omega expectations and traditions.' Be soft spoken, be kind at all times, keep a properly pleasing appearance, learn to keep a home, learn to tend to pups, and most importantly of all Stay Chaste.

No proper alpha or beta would want a second hand mate after all, or so they'd all heard over and over growing up.

Jean laughed at it all and Armin had always done his best to fall in line even when it was the last thing he'd wanted to do. He'd always kind of envied his friend; the Kirstein family didn't have high standing in the pack so he didn't have the pressure of a name weighing down on him and he didn't have that 'omega look' and no amount of 'proper behavior and dress' was going to change that. When Jean had turned 14 and been available to be courted the suitors had been...scarce.

Much to Jean's delight.

Armin, however, was the the only son of the former First Alpha and Omega, the last member of his immediate family of breeding age, and of a pure bloodline. It was a lot to have on his shoulders. He was expected to breed well since he might well birth the next leader of the pack, assuming he had alpha children and the current leader didn't.

There was status in his name whether he liked it or not.

He didn't.

People courted status. It helped, of course, that he was small and had a certain delicate look to him, some may have even gone so far as to call him pretty (though never to his face) with 'child bearing hips' (another thing never said where he could hear it and, in his opinion, not even true.) He had the look and projected the demeanor of the proper submissive omega mate, just willing and waiting for the perfect suitor to come along.

They came with their courting gifts and promises of all manner of things. Not just from their clan but from the Northern and Southern ones they traded with as well. (The far north clan where his carrier and grandfather had come from was especially interested in him, having sent a representative every breeding cycle for the past two years.) He'd gone on dates, chaperoned and always perfectly appropriate so as not to let any harm come to his reputation, and for every date he'd gone on there were suitors who his grandfather had declared to be not good enough and sent on their way before he'd even met them.

He preferred they get weeded out before he had to spend time with them and then reject them so he didn't mind his grandfather's nearly impossible to meet standards. He was more than content to spend his days by the creek with the other unmated omegas, toes trailing in the water and avoiding their chores, and his nights under the stars camped out with Jean, avoiding their families.

But all too soon he was 18 and Jean was dangerously close to 20 and they were sitting at the creek surrounded by omegas at least 3 years Armin's junior. Connie had been the last holdout but now all of their peers had been married off and were either round with child or already chasing pups around. 

But not them.

People had started whispering about them being spinsters, or getting damn close to it, just wasting their most fertile years away (a luxury Armin might not have had at all considering his carrier's 'unfortunate' history with childbearing) and suggesting that soon enough no one worth anything would so much as look their way.

A not inconsiderable amount of the whispers came from Jean's father but if Jean was bothered by it he never let it show. The opposite actually; the idea of a barren womb seemed to actually thrill him. (Pups, he'd said with a sneer, were sticky stinky wailing things not worth getting fat over.) Armin's grandfather had recently taken the idea of Jean just acting as his second, the omega closest to him who'd help him raise his pups whenever he had them, to the First Alpha and Jean was fine with it because being someone's second meant he wasn't expected to ever marry. 

It was the best possible outcome as far as Jean was concerned.

Armin didn't agree and, for all the rejection and ducking of the idea of mating he'd done, the idea of marriage and children certainly appealed to him. It always had, in it's own way, it was just that he was waiting for a certain alpha to come with an offering to his cabin.

He was waiting for Eren.

Had been since before he'd realized what it was to want someone or what it meant to have his sights set on an alpha as not just a potential mate but the one he absolutely wanted. He'd never entertained the idea of someone else, not really, and a big part of that was that he'd grown up with the reminder that he'd been promised to Eren hanging over him.

When his sire had married outside of the clan, brought in an outsider as the First Omega, the elders had only consented under the promise that the first born would marry within the clan. It came down to bloodlines and not letting the power be further diluted by marrying outside. Grisha Yeager's alpha son, two years older than Armin, had been the perfect option. More than perfect because, like Armin, his carrier's people had come from an outside clan.

Eren would have been First Alpha, provided no challengers bested him, and Armin First Omega and just like their biggest ally to the north and the biggest ally to the south would have been connected to them by blood and status.

But then his parents and Eren’s mother as well as a few other wolves had been murdered (by hunters or outside rivals or perhaps inside rivals, who could say?) and Erwin had become alpha. The power in marrying him had become iffy because if Erwin ever had pups of his own they would be first in line as either first Alpha or First Mate and the tenuous hold he had as 'Prince' would mean nothing.

If only Armin could be so lucky.

On top of that his grandfather had come from the north and demanded a dissolution of the engagement. Armin, he'd insisted, was not an object to be used to strike deals. He was half northern and from a pure bloodline and that meant he should be courted properly and the most alpha or beta chosen.

He'd been 15 when Erwin had dissolved the engagement. If not for his parents and Carla Yeager dying he and Eren would have married, or at least begun officially courting since it wasn't as if there had been some great hurry then, shortly after his debut in the spring of his 14 th year.

Sometimes he'd regretted how things had gone. He'd been devastated to lose his parents, heartbroken for Eren and Mikasa, furious that there were no answers as to what had happened, and mating had been far from his mind. By the time the typical mourning period was over and people were permitted to approach him with courtship offerings, and he was finally starting to feel like a person again, the engagement had been up for review.

Still he hadn't been worried. He'd expected Eren to come with a courting gift right away, to make his intentions to keep him known to the clan, but it had never happened.

So Armin was waiting. Until Eren came to him he was content to reject suitors and enjoy being unmated.

It was, admittedly, taking longer than he’d thought it would at first. Eren had started pulling away from their little group after the engagement had been broken, away from him, and started traveling off of clan lands more and more with his father, making the rounds between the various allied clans to provide medical care.

Now he was gone more often than not and when he was around he was often busy helping with cabin raising, hunting, even chaperoning other courting couples!

There wasn't much time for Armin. It was hard to deal with, mating aside. They'd been raised together, had literally shared a crib on occasion, and they had been the very best of friends long before puberty had reared it's confusing head. They'd been squeaking hairless pups together, stayed together during their first shifting moons, run the forest side by side and now he couldn't get so much as a smile some days.

Jean, who Armin had to grudgingly admit had a real talent for understanding people and their motivations, said it was just stupid alpha shit. The sudden revelation that the people who'd always been friends were actually potential mates and that people would actually be interested always threw alphas through a loop. They saw their childhood friends as theirs, part of their primary pack, and alphas didn’t like to share what they thought of as theirs. They were selfish and possessive creatures by nature and even if they themselves weren’t interested mating with a person the idea of other’s taking their pack away was hard to deal with. 

That was why so many bachelor alphas roamed together instead of with betas and omegas or left their family cabins to live on the very edge of the clan's land in tents or hastily constructed, and deconstructed, shelters.

If Eren had been interested in him none of those things would have mattered. He would have stayed close, set up camp by Armin's cabin, brought the usual offerings, took him on the stupid dates, made sure his scent lingered on Armin's skin and around his home so that all other interested suitors knew he was there.

But he didn't.

Armin wondered sometimes if Eren had always just been resigned to their engagement and once free had been all to happy to cut all ties. Had Armin been falling in love before he'd even known what love was, hanging on Eren's every word and able to think of no one else, while Eren had merely tolerated him?

Had they even been friends at all?

“Just fucking ask him.” Jean said for what must have been the twelfth time that day. “Hell, take him a courting gift. Go roll around in his clothes and scent everything. Better yet, just go bust into his shack and suck his dick.”

Armin flushed and ducked away from the fogged over window to glare at his friend. Jean had been giving him crap non-stop since he'd dragged him out of the Kirstein's back cabin that morning and seemed like he wasn't going to be letting up anytime soon.

In Jean's defense it had been a particularly harsh and long winter and the weather today was no exception. Normally they wouldn't have ventured outside let alone walked the mile into the main part of the the pack's encampment but today was the day Eren and his father had been due back from their trip south. There had been some kind of outbreak that had swept through about a half dozen of the southern clans; they'd left in early November and now, in mid-March, they were finally back.

Armin couldn’t help but note that they were just in time for the spring mating season to start.

He was, perhaps foolishly, absurdly excited. He'd gotten a letter around his birthday, a hastily written apology for having to be away as if Eren hadn’t been gone for the previous birthday as well, along with a small metal charm in the shape of the clan’s symbol. Another letter had appeared at Christmas and had come attached to a book on herbs common to the southern regions and he was...hopeful.

So he'd dragged Jean out of the warm comfort of his furs, volunteered them for water fetching and then nursery duty just so he could be in the main circle when Eren got back. The cabin he shared with his grandfather was further away, along the same stretch as the Yeager and Kirstein homes close to the top of the creek, and he knew if he waited over there he'd be behind Carla and Mikasa and her mates in line to see Eren.

Jean had come along but he was not happy about it.

Not that Jean was ever happy about being out in the cold or anything to do with his 'disgusting pining for Yeager'.

“Don't say things like that.” Armin hissed. He chanced a glance at Petra, the omega who worked the nursery (giving a much needed break to new parents) found that she was still occupied with the other volunteers for the day, and turned his gaze back to the window.

Eren and his father were in the main circle, a small sunken and carved out area around the meeting stone that all the common cabins were arranged around and that all the paths on the ground lead to, talking with Erwin.

The snow was still coming down; the bachelor alphas had been tasked with keeping the paths clear and the ice salted but it seemed to fall and build back up in now time at all. It clung to the tops of the cabins, making them look like gingerbread houses heavy with white icing and lined with gleaming sugar icicles.

“Like what?” Jean asked, voice thick with exasperation. Armin wasn't sure if it was the situation or the squalling baby that Jean had been tasked to care for that had him angrier. “That you should stop being stupid and hung up on Yeager of all people or that you should go and hop on his knot like you've been wanting to do-”

“Jean!” Armin snapped, cheeks heating up as he looked back at the others in the cabin. They weren't supposed to talk about things like that in polite company, though how polite any company involving Jean could actually be was up to debate. “Please.”

There were rumors, which of course Armin didn't listen to or give any credence especially since the rumors never seemed to have a source or anyone who actually said they'd been with him, that Jean wasn't pure. He'd never asked and Jean wasn't offering up the information but the way he talked about things like sex and knotting so blandly was...it was very Jean. Everything he did was with an air of 'would rather be anywhere but here' and involved saying exactly what he thought regardless of who was around and how it would be perceived.

Outside Erwin was nodding at something Dr. Yeager was saying. They were all in leather pants and tunics, no furs or cloaks to be seen, as if the blistering cold didn't bother them at all. Eren shifted slightly on his spot next to his father, brushing snow from his hair, then started looking around, scanning his surroundings.

Armin ducked away from the window before those familiar green eyes could turn towards the nursery. Jean made a disgusted noise.

“You're pathetic.”

Armin pressed himself against the cool wood of the wall, something like shame blooming inside of him, and glowered up at the other man. “We can't all be like you Jean.”

No matter how much he may have wanted to.

“What the hell does that mean?” Jean demanded then, before Armin could think of an answer that wasn't 'an uncaring jerk', the unhappily sniffling pup was shoved into his hands. Armin was certain there wasn’t an omega in the world with a less maternal natural than Jean. “Never mind, forget it. I'm not feeling so hot all of a sudden.”

Armin yelped in alarm at having his hands full of squirming baby. He juggled the pup, who stopping crying for the first time since Jean had picked her up to giggle wetly, and when he finally had her steady against his hip he found his friend was nowhere in sight.

Petra, however, was in sight and was glaring at him.

He groaned. Once the silent scolding was over he turned his attention back to the window, careful to angle himself so the baby was as far from the chilly glass as possible.

He was going to have to apologize to Jean as soon as he could. He knew that Jean was having problems with his father again, having gone so far as to not leave the back cabin for any reason that wasn't fetching water or hunting for the past week, but he'd dragged him out anyway. A blow up had been inevitable but pointing out how 'different' Jean was had been asking for trouble.

Jean had been in varying stages of 'bad mood' since his parents had decided to have more children and pushed him out to the small cabin behind the main house. It wasn't something that was unheard of, or even all that awful because Armin would have killed to get out from under his grandfather's eye 24-7, but the circumstances weren't the best.

Everyone knew that Jean's father was interested in climbing the social ladder, as it was. The easiest way to do that was through marriage and mating into a higher up family or fighting for power. The Kirstein's were an alphaless family so fighting was out, since power flowed from alpha to alpha, so the next best option was marriage. Jean being born an omega had been promising but by the time Jean was 16 it had been pretty clear that he intended to reject the few suitors he did have.

So more pups had been born and Jean had found himself living outside of the main house. Supposedly Mr. Kirstein had wanted to send him off to another one of the clans to find work but Mrs. Kirstein, one of the sweetest and calmest omegas Armin had ever met, had let her claws out.

Even with his mother's support Jean was, at best, two steps away from sulking at any given moment and a sulky Jean was damn near impossible to deal with. It would have been smarter to just weather that storm but now that Mikasa had mated he didn't have much left by way of friends who weren't busy being 'adults' so he was going to have to deal with it head on unless he wanted to brave the Ackerman cabin for company. 

And he didn’t. 

Mikasa was family, his sister in all ways but blood, but he’d still pick Jean’s attitude over a prickly alpha coddling her mates and bristling over any imagined threat to their future pups any day. 

Outside another person had joined the conversation. Armin cocked his head to the side in interest; he didn't know this person. Their pack was the largest in the country with about 500 wolves total and around 100 still considered pups living on the clan's grounds but that wasn't nearly so many that Armin didn't have an idea of who everyone was.

He'd spent 14 years being prepared to be the First Omega after all. Knowing his people had been a requirement of the job and after all that time habits were hard to change.

He couldn't see much of the stranger since, unlike the Yeagers and Erwin, they were bundled up, though it was completely in the human style. Heavy looking black boots, denim pants, a bulky brown coat over another hooded coat, and a black knit hat; definitely not one of them.

Someone from one of the southern clans most likely. What he could see of the stranger was a darker brown than even Eren who, being half southern, remained tan even in the dead of winter, and he thought he could see dark hair peeking out from under the hat.

It wasn't unheard of for Grisha to bring back so-called strays with him when he went on his longer trips. Mikasa had come to their clan like that but she'd been a child and no one ever wanted to turn away a parent-less pup.

Adults, however, were a very different story. It wasn't always easy, for better or worse, to be accepted as an outsider to such a large and close knit wolf pack without a mixing of bloodlines. Most of the adult strays Grisha brought back with him ended up leaving soon enough but a handful had stayed and been able to make places for themselves.

He didn't get much time to think on the stranger, or how they were standing so close to Eren that is suggested a certain familiarity with each other, when the sound of the door of the nursery banging open and then slamming closed had him jumping in surprise. He looked reflexively towards the front room; the nursery was separated by a wall into a small front room where tables, benches, and a small kitchen were and the back room where everything else was.

There was a doorway cut into the wall, allowing some sight between the rooms, but Armin wasn't at the right angle to see anything. However Petra, the other omegas, and the handful of pups were all still present and he couldn't hear anyone up front which could only mean

His heart jumped into his throat when he looked back out of the window to see Jean striding towards the small congregation around the meeting stone.

What was he doing?


	2. You're A Good Boy and You Know It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Summary: It’s hard to say if Jean is wingmanning or just torturing Armin for getting on his nerves but it's almost certainly based in bitterness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mondays are good days for updates, amirite?

What had he been thinking?

It was too damn cold to be outside in nothing but his leather shoes and the first furlined cloak he could grab tossed over him. Jean was used to a certain degree of cold, to snow and ice, but this was literally the coldest winter of his nineteen years. It was, he'd heard, on par with the winters the far north clans had adapted to survive through with with their thicker winter coats, shorter snouts, and stronger claws.

Which was great for the northern wolves-or half northerners like a certain blond that had made him come outside at toodamnearly in the morning-but Jean, like most of the clan, was descended from wolves who were used to more mild seasons overall and it was keeping most everyone indoors lately. The last new moon run had only consisted of a few of the stupider bachelor alphas who thought that being out in freezing weather made them look strong and the Erwin, who had to show up for such things.

And yet there stood their First Alpha, the clan doctor, and Eren-who didn't normally meet Jean's standards for a stupid bachelor alpha but had his moments-gathered around the meeting stone like snow wasn't actively coming down in fat icy clumps all around them.

He understood that it was 'The Law' that wolves report to the First in the meeting circle when they came back from a journey to exchange information and update on whatever their reason for leaving had been. It was pretty reasonable in theory but the rain, snow, or shine element was just dumb.

He noted, as he shuffled over, that they had gained a fourth while he was inside getting ready to brave the cold and a sensibly dressed fourth at that.

Jean had never been so jealous of boots in all his life. He hadn’t been at all prepared when he’d left his cabin that morning and now he was paying for it.

He hadn't intended to give the stranger much more than a quick once over, he was on a mission after all, but two things happened at once that changed that. First, as he descended the hard packed earthen stairs into the sunken circle, the stranger pushed back his hood and took off his hat. It was the universal sign for 'no harm meant' for an alpha to show their face when omegas and beta females were present, some kind of silly precaution held over from days when feral alphas were more common and trust between wolves was more nebulous a concept.

The gesture wasn't surprising in and of itself but that he'd been pegged as omega strictly by sight, since it was snowing far too hard for his scent to not be near impossible to pick up, was. Not that people of all dynamics didn't come in all shapes and sizes but, in a general stereotypical sense, Jean looked more like a beta or alpha than he did an omega.

The second thing, which had him practically stopping in his tracks, was the man's face, and once he was really looking, his neck as well. It looked like he had been...mauled, for lack of a nicer word.

One of his eyes was covered in an eye patch, black against brown skin. Two long jagged streaks of scar tissue, each about finger width, crossed from just above his ear to under the patch, and stopped after midway over his nose. Another set of marks, this time a set of four, went from the corner of his mouth, over his cheek, and down his jaw to meet his neck where Jean could see a patch of raised shiny flesh that took up a large chunk of the area before vanishing beneath his coat. There were more scars crisscrossing diagonally across his throat and out of sight.

Had another wolf done that?

He'd never seen anything like that to even begin to compare it to. He'd seen some people beat up after mating disputes and a territory fight or two but never anything that looked that bad before. For the most part wolves healed fast and scarring wasn't common. Not impossible, Jean was going to be walking around with the impression of Eren's teeth on his flank for the rest of his life and Eren had a nice set of claw marks on his back from a scuffle that had started for reasons neither could remember except that they'd all had a few rough years and he and Eren in particular had been on the edge of violence a lot, but damage to extent of what this alpha was showing was...

It looked like someone or something had wanted him dead.

“Kirstein.” Erwin's sharp tone brought him to the present and to the realization he'd been staring, practically open mouthed, like some kind of asshole. He shut his mouth and, after a moment of indecision, bowed his head slightly.

“Sorry.”

There was a beat of stunned silence and Jean endured it, chalking it up as penance for staring.

Jean Kirstein wasn't known for his apologies and even less for his ability to show respect to others but, hell, the guy had gone ahead and done the proper uncovering his head thing in spite of his scars, so the least Jean could do was play along and show the back of his neck.

Just this once.

And it was more symbolic than anything since he’d barely put his head down and his neck was covered by the cloak so it wasn’t that big a gesture really.

Just big enough.

He caught the stranger's lips quirking up into a half smile that pulled at the scars by his mouth and a hint of humor in the deep brown eye that wasn't hidden.

“Not a problem. I understand my good looks are distractin’.” His accent was noticeable, but not that thick, a slow, almost musical, drawl. Jean shivered then pulled his cloak tighter around himself.

Fucking winter. He hated being cold so much.

He should have been back in his tiny one room cabin, curled up in front of the oven and doing something that wasn't standing in the snow waiting for his toes to fucking freeze off. His shoes were moisture proof and had a thin lining of downy rabbit fur inside but he felt like he might as well have been barefoot for all the good they were doing.

“Did you just apologize?” Eren asked, sounding so bewildered that Jean was actually a little offended.

Grisha chuckled, heedless of the withering look Jean shot them. “Maybe all that talk about this storm being proof of the end times was worth something after all.”

“That's what my gram been sayin'.” The stranger said, laughter in his voice. “Then 'gain, she been saying that for 'bout ten years.”

“You needed something?” Erwin looked as dour as he usually did. It was hard to believe sometimes he was the brother of the former First Alpha and Armin's uncle because he never smiled or looked anything but hyper serious. Armin’s sire had been a warm person and everyone had adored her and her mate.

Erwin on the other hand was a good leader and the pack was doing well under him-new allies, more trade between the other packs, less in-pack fighting than ever before- but he wasn’t as well liked as the former First.

“Armin and I were working in the nursery-” He pretended he didn't see Eren's eyebrows go up in surprise. “But I'm not feeling well so I'm heading home. I was hoping you could assign a escort to see Armin home.”

Mostly he was tired of Armin's shit. There was a line of alphas and beta men willing to leave their homes to join their clan and pledge undying loyalty (or something like it) to Armin but the blond only had eyes for their shitty alpha friend and to say it was frustrating to be party to all the gross pining would have been an understatement.

“An escort? Armin?” Eren was, sadly, not as stupid as he looked and looked appropriately skeptical.

Armin didn't need anyone watching him. He wasn't the biggest guy around, far from it, but he'd been a target for bullying (being the son of the First Alpha hadn't endeared him to the older pups much when they'd been younger) so Mikasa and Eren had made sure he had some idea of how to defend himself. Anyone who thought Armin would be a pushover simply because he was small or because he was an omega was in for a bad time.

Erwin however was nodding; he was Armin's uncle but he didn't know his nephew half as well as he and Eren did. “There are about a half dozen suitors from other clans on the grounds this month. It would be wise for him to have someone with him for propriety's sake.”

That was a nice way of saying 'so Armin doesn't do anything shameful that could ruin his reputation and make him undesirable.'

As if Armin would ever. The only time Armin had ever stepped a toe out of line in all their lives was when Eren or Mikasa asked him to go out on unsupervised hunts or fishing trips or getting Grisha to bring him all those human history books and trinkets he kept hidden away.

“A half dozen?” Eren echoed, expression unreadable.

“Eren will do it.” Grisha said, clapping his son on the shoulder. Eren made a face that Jean could only describe as 'complicated'. “He's still on the escort list.”

“Oh good.” Jean said, trying to keep the smug satisfaction he was feeling from seeping into his voice. “Good thing you aren't one of Armin's suitors isn't it?”

Eren's expression promised pain. Jean flashed him a toothy smile; Eren was, or had been, one of his best friends but never had they been above fucking with each other. Jean liked to think it kept their friendship honest. Or he had thought that; now he felt like he couldn't begin to fathom why Eren did the things he did or what his problem was.

“Don't you need an escort?”

Jean's smile dropped immediately. Oh right, Eren's problem was that he was a little shit. “No.”

He didn't have any suitors that he needed a chaperon to deal with or a reputation worth worrying about and Eren knew that better than most. Protecting him, and his virtue, from forward or handsy alphas and betas was no longer a concern anyone in the clan had.

“Still with stranger alphas wandering around you can't be too careful.” Grisha said; Jean wasn't sure if he was cheerfully oblivious to what was going on or just cheerful because he was all too willing to help his son mess with Jean.

With Grisha it was a pretty even chance of either.

“Marco can go with you.” Who the fuck was Marco and why did Eren look so pleased with himself?

Grisha nodded his agreement. “Jean's cabin is on the same path as mine. Once he's safely home you can go on and get settled.”

The stranger shrugged and Jean twitched in irritation; how did this guy not qualify as a 'stranger alpha' exactly? 

But Erwin was lending his approval and, while as a general rule Jean didn't know how to quit when he was ahead or pick his battles, he knew there wasn't any point trying to change the First Alpha's mind. 

After letting Eren know Armin would be done in an hour, give or take, and getting nothing but a grunt in reply, he and 'Marco' fell in step together on one of the paths that lead to the eastern part of the compound.

The alpha walked so Jean was on the side of his face that wasn't covered in scars. He could see that, without the scars to distract, the man was certainly...not unattractive, with a heavy sprinkling of freckles over his nose and cheeks and lips that seemed fixed in a permanent ghost of a smile.

They'd gotten about halfway, Jean drawing the cloak even closer to him in an attempt to keep the razor sharp wind from cutting right through him and wishing he had something to cover his hands, when Marco stopped walking. He stopped as well, turning slightly so he could tell the alpha they still had over a half mile to go and that it was too damn cold for sightseeing, but the protest died when he saw Marco was shrugging out of his coat.

“What are you doing? What's with alphas and not wanting to be covered up?” He felt colder just watching. Marco's lips twitched up again then he stepped forward, so close that Jean could feel a warm puff of air over his skin, and reached around him.

Jean started to lean back, to put space between them, when the coat fell over his shoulders. It settled over him, the warmth from Marco's body and the faint trace of musk and an almost burnt sugar sweetness that prodded at a memory Jean couldn't quite grasp, clinging to it.  It was thick and heavy, heavier than anything Jean owned, and lined with soft fake fur that brushed over his neck when he tilted his head down to look at it in surprise.

“Um.”

“You looked cold.” Marco stepped back, hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans. “What's wit' you midland wolves and not wanting to be covered up?”

Jean was sure that if his face hadn't already been red from the wind and cold he would have blushed. Instead he turned and started walking again, considering the coat. He needed to refuse the coat, alphas letting you use or have their things was always loaded with meaning and implications and rules, god there were so many fucking rules but...

Jean really hated the cold. He might have hated it more than he hated all the stupid rules that tried to regulate interaction between wolves but, since accepting the coat had the bonus of being contrary to the ‘rules’ it was an all around win when he thought about it that way.

He slipped his hands through the sleeves and quickly zipped the coat up. It was a little big on him, sleeves just long enough to cover part of his palms; without the bulky coat on he could see that Marco was a little broader in the shoulders than him, limbs a little longer, but not by much.

“If you're going to give up your coat you should at least put your hat back on.” Is what he said instead of thank you once his hands were happily inside the pockets of Marco's coat and brushing over what felt like a wallet, keys, change, and something cool that was just almost too large for him to close his hand around. He rubbed over it, feeling the ridges and rounded smoothness, curious in spite of himself.

Marco laughed, a cloud of steamy air leaving his mouth. “'m pretty sure that'd be 'improper' of me. Don't wan' folks seein' me as some kind of rogue my first day here.”

Jean knew mockery when he heard it and found himself smiling just a little. “I think it's fine as long as you don't do anything 'improper' towards me.”

“There goes my plan for the afternoon.” Marco sounded downright mournful. Jean realized that, cold be damned, he could still manage to blush all the way up to the tips of his frigid ears. He coughed and looked down at the ground; the snow on the dirt paths was about ankle deep and hard enough that it wasn't mixing to form a crust of mostly frozen mud like it had been earlier in the morning when Armin had dragged him out.

The part of that path they were all was lined with trees on both sides; the branches were heavy with snow and ice, bowing towards them under the weight. The sun was low in the sky and making everything around them gleam in pinks and oranges as if the sky had fallen along with the snow.

It was quiet out, as it tended to be in the winter. Most of the wildlife had gone south or were hibernating by now. The creek was frozen through (getting water the past few days had been far from fun.) and the nearby river wasn't much better, so the usual sounds of rushing water were also gone. There was just the crunch of their feet through the snow and the sounds of fabric rustling as they walked.

He chanced another look at Marco and found the alpha was looking around with unveiled interest.

“You're from one of the southern clans?”

Marco hummed then reached up to brush some snow from his hair. It was glossy black, pin straight, and looked thick, half held back with a strip of fabric and the rest just long enough to brush over his shoulders. “You saying I don' look like I'm from 'round here?”

“I was asking because you're looking around like all this snow is great instead of a nuisance.”

“Ah. No, we don't get much snow where I'm from. Never like this at least.” A teasing smile was tossed his way. “You're not a fan.”

“I don't like being stuck inside.”

And wasn't that a change? When he'd been younger he'd been the one inside, always under his mother's skirts and unwilling to be dragged out to play with the others. He'd hated being dirty or wet or uncomfortable, climbing trees and splashing in the creek hadn't interested him, and he hadn't had much appreciation for the loud games his peers played.

Or his peers in general.

In hindsight, he could admit he'd been something of a priss, as Eren had so often put it.

He'd been fine with the idea of being someone's omega, comfortable and cared for inside the house. He’d played the game for a time, in his own way. He’d had his suitors, though not even close to as many as Armin or under such careful scrutiny, and he’d quietly accepted a courting gift shortly after his fourteenth birthday.

Within a year he’d been flat out rejecting everyone and he wasn't Armin so the offers had dried up fairly quickly after that. He preferred it that way. 

There had been more to it than just that though. Little things had added up over time even if that had been the tipping point.

The sudden growth spurt that had made him bigger than all of the other omegas, the onset of general annoyance with everything and everyone that had seemed to set in with puberty and never left, the arguments with his father and the pressure to fix what he’d done ‘wrong’ that had ended in the broken courtship.  Learning a lesson about how people really were that he was unlikely to ever forget.

At some point he'd just...stopped wanting to care about what people wanted and what he was supposed to be doing.

Being on the track to play nanny for Armin’s future kids wasn't what he'd thought he'd be doing but things changed and he'd long since come to terms with that. It kept him from dealing with courting or the ‘omega expectations’ unless he was one day inclined to do so, which was pretty fucking unlikely.

“I understand.” Marco looked at him, gaze intent. “My family, my people, we wandered a lot when I was younger, up and down the coast. North in the summer, back south before the weather turned, like birds. Spent so much time sleeping outside I neva got the hang of being inside, 'ccording to my ma.”

“That sounds,” Jean hesitated over his words, realizing that 'amazing' was maybe overdoing it just a little, even if that's exactly what he meant. “Nice.”

“It is. Was.” Marco agreed, pushing his hands deeper into his pockets. “Should be back in Jinae bout now, making travel plans for spring.”

“So,” Jean veered off of the main path as he spoke; if they followed it would curve up to the bridge that spanned the river. “Why are you here instead of there?”

They had to walk single file through the trees, treading through the partially snow filled impressions he and Armin had left hours before, so he couldn't see Marco's face. His parent's cabin, along with the Arlert, Ackerman, and Yeager homes, weren't really on a cleared path so much as a well traveled strip of dirt where nothing grew anymore that snaked around the trees and through the underbrush. The pack didn't like to knock down trees unless it was needed, appreciating the privacy and protection the forest provided them.

“You just go right for the personal questions don't you?”

Jean snorted; he hadn't been going for personal really, just curious about why someone would give up a life of travel to hang out on their lands during the worst winter on record. But, as it happened, he did in fact always go right for the personal questions.

“Is that a nice way of asking if I'm always this rude?”

“Well. I am a nice guy.” He could hear the smile in Marco's voice and found himself wanting to smile in response. Instead he pointed to the left.

“Ackerman house. Mikasa, Eren's sister, lives there with her mates Sasha and Connie. They're due for pups in the summer so be careful getting too close. Sasha is a great shot and she's been kind of trigger happy lately.”

Franz had learned that the hard way when he'd tried to come by to get Mikasa to come out for a hunt. Sasha had only grazed his head-which was disappointing because if anyone deserved to get an arrow shot through their eye it was Franz- but the message had been clear enough to everyone.

And that was without factoring in Mikasa but if Marco was going to be staying with the Yeager's he'd meet the other alpha soon enough. No reason to scare him when Mikasa could do that just fine herself.

Mikasa deciding to take the inseparable beta female and male omega as her mates had caused a flurry of talk (sometimes Jean thought there was nothing for most of the people in the pack to do besides talk.) but in the end Mikasa did what she wanted and always had.

If Jean thought about it hard enough he thought maybe he'd seen it coming. Sasha and Connie had been joined at the hip their whole lives (like Eren and Armin had been once.) so it went without saying that anyone who wanted one would have to take on both and maybe Mikasa had always been a little more careful and a little more attentive with them, a little kinder and gentler than she ever was with anyone except Eren, a little more apt to fix her steely gaze on anyone who strayed too close to the duo.

“My ma thinks 'm getting 'wild'.” Jean hadn't expected to get an answer and now that he was getting one he found himself thinking Marco didn't seem like the wild type. He banished the thought as quickly as it came; with scars like that who knew what what the other man liked to get into.

He wondered if wild was really ‘wild’ or if it meant ‘feral’ but set that thought aside as well. Wild or restless was one thing but there was no way the Yeagers would bring a feral wolf back to the clan. Feral meant unpredictable and violent, the sort of person who forgot how to be a anything other than a wolf who happened to have human skin.  

“Seems to think finding a nice mate would help calm me down.”

Marco's tone made it very clear how he felt about that but Jean chanced a glance back in time to see him rolling his eye.

He turned back; his parent's cabin was coming up next so he slowed his pace some. “You’re not a fan?”

Marco was quiet just long enough for Jean to wonder if mimicry had been a bad idea (and just after hearing that the alpha was, apparently, ‘Wild’ too) and then laughed. “I happen to think 'm nice enough for myself and another person already is all. Don' need anymore nice.”

“I don't think there's a cap.” He came to a stop a few paces from his parents cabin and started unzipping the coat. “This is me. If you keep following the footprints once they pick up over there it'll take you straight to the Yeager place. You can kind of see it from here.”

Once upon a time it would have been easier to see; Mrs. Yeager had kept her home warm and brightly lit in the winter and there had always been cocoa and something to eat waiting when they’d come in from the cold. Now it was cold and dark more often than not.

“Wait.” Marco held up a hand to stop him from shrugging out of the coat then shook his head. “'m supposed to see you in, yeah? This isn't in. I take my responsibilities very seriously.”

Jean stared at him, searching for a hint that the alpha was being anything other than serious and, not finding one, groaned. “Fine. This way.”

His tiny one room cabin, originally only used when he was in heat and now where he stayed full time, was a short walk around the larger building and across the patch of land they used for a small garden when the growing season came around. Light was streaming out of the main cabin and he could hear his mother in the kitchen and, if he focused, the quiet high pitched noises of his younger sisters somewhere inside.

Marco stayed at his heels, only offering a raised eyebrow when Jean stopped outside of his door. He sighed, loudly, then pushed open the door and stepped inside. He was rewarded with a bright smile.

“This is stupid.”

He didn't like people seeing inside of his cabin. Not that there was much to it; one room with a wood burning stove, a table with matching chairs, shelving built into the walls for holding cans and jars of food, a hammock he'd hung up by the back window, and the pile of furs and blankets that he slept on.

There was an ice chest but he'd shoved it outside to stand with the water barrel when it had gotten cold, figuring there was no reason to bring ice in when it was so available outdoors, and a small pantry under the floor. Basic (and ice cold now, thanks to Armin dragging him out for so long), but it served it's purpose.

Marco shrugged. “So you say but seeing you inside means inside to me. Keep the coat for now, I've got another one and your place looks cold.”

“I don't-”

Marco was already turning away, waving over his shoulder as he went. “Later.”

Jean watched him until he'd vanished into the tree line then slammed his door shut, inexplicably annoyed. He didn't need Marco's coat or an escort all the way to his front door or anything like that. It was a nice gesture sure but he knew better than to think that 'nice' was ever just for the sake of it with other wolves.

Especially with alphas. With very few expectations (and those exceptions were named Eren and Mikasa) alphas only came sniffing around when they were after something and Jean had stumbled down that road already.

He still left the coat on until he had the stove going and heat started to suffuse the room and he ended up dropping it onto his nest when he finally took it off.

He flopped into the hammock, taking a bear fur and his sketchpad with him. He was filling a third page with sketches of full lips, long jagged scars slashing through freckles, and a singular eye (in his defense Marco had an interesting face.) when his front door slammed open.

Jean didn't bother looking looking to see what was happening even though the force of the door opening caused it to slam against the wall; Armin was the only person who took it upon himself to come in without knocking.

Or at all aside from his mother. Even Mikasa had taken to hanging around just outside of the doorway at some point when he hadn't really been paying attention.

Rules.

“What did Eren do?” He asked as he used his finger to smudge the corner of the eye he was working on a little bit more.

And maybe it was wrong to assume but it wasn’t as if there was anything else that ever upset Armin aside from his lack of progress with Eren. Jean, personally, didn’t see the point in wasting time pining after Eren of all people (He could think of a half dozen more attractive, more intelligent, and less grating potentials for Armin off the top of his head) but it wasn’t his choice to make.

Though the real mystery was less about Armin’s affections and more about what the hell Yeager was up to anyway. They’d all been close once, before Carla Yeager had died, and Jean would have said he understood Eren better than most but now he couldn’t begin to imagine what went on in his former friend’s head.

“My grandfather found me a mate.”

That got his attention. He looked up and found Armin, red faced, wide eyed, and absolutely furious looking. He was shaking with hands balled up at his sides and breath coming out in short angry bursts. Jean hadn’t seen Armin look this upset since Erwin had announced to the pack that no more resources could be spared trying to find out how and why a half dozen of their pack members, including the first couple, had been murdered.

“He what?” Jean lowered his sketchpad. That didn’t sound right at all; Armin’s grandfather had come from the north with the sole goal of making sure Armin got to choose a mate for himself, why would he suddenly change his mind about something like that?

“A mate. He...I...this.” Armin fell into an angry sputter and, after a few open mouthed moments with no sound he stalked over and slammed the door shut hard enough that the shelves and window rattled from it.

Jean winced but kept his mouth firmly shut. He knew Armin well enough to know that sometimes the blond just had to get it out without being stopped and that it was better to sacrifice a few jars of jam than to risk getting his hand bitten off.

Armin paced back and forth in the limited amount of open space there was then, huffing angrily, threw himself onto the pile of furs on the floor. Jean frowned, pretty sure he was about to witness the shredding of some perfectly nice bear and beaver pelts. Then Armin sat up, expression going from angry to confused.

“What’s this?” He was holding a coat, the coat, up. Before Jean could think of an answer Armin had brought it close to his face and breathed in. His eyebrows went up. “Did that visiting alpha give you this?”

“No. ...not...I’m borrowing it. I’ll be giving it back next time I see him.” Jean muttered, gaze darting away from the offending item.

“And you decided to keep it in your nest until then?” The implication was literally dripping from Armin’s voice. 

“I thought we were talking about you and your ‘mate’?” He jumped up as he spat the words out and yanked the coat from Armin’s hands. Then, seeing his friend’s face fall, instantly felt terrible for doing it. 

“You’re right. Why talk about your mysterious alpha when we can talk about how I’m being sent to the north to marry someone old enough to be my father?” There was a note of sadness to Armin’s voice that clawed at Jean. “I need to stop caring about stupid pup things like romance and mystery anyway. I’ll probably be with child within the year.”

Jean sighed then, silently asking why he had to be born in the same whelping period as Armin and not with some nice normal low status wolves, sat down next to him. It was manipulation, and not even a good attempt at it; Armin was laying it on incredibly thick and could do much better-he'd been batting his eyes and convincing people to do chores for himself and Jean for years- but he had listened to Jean throw a temper tantrum or two about less important things so he could play along.

“His name is Marco and he’s from a southern clan. He isn’t my mysterious anything.”

Armin scooted closer and, showing total disregard for how much he valued his personal space, laid his head on Jean’s shoulder. Jean decided to allow it. Armin was having a pretty shit night so he could suck it up. Compromise seemed to be the theme of the day. 

“He seemed...nice.”

"He smells nice." Jean could actually hear the eyebrow waggle. "Reminds me of something." 

"Shut up." He muttered. Then, letting himself glance down at the coat and focus on the warm smell that had started to permeate his nest, had a memory finally click into place. Eren's mother, ushering them all inside from the snow to find steaming cups of cocoa and fresh bread waiting on the table. "Sweet bread." 

Armin's quiet laugh was worth the teasing he'd probably be enduring.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To clarify: Armin's parents, Carla Yeager, and the other wolves who died were killed in the winter after Armin's 14th birthday. Had this not happened Eren and Armin's courtship would have started that spring. Eren and Mikasa started traveling with Grisha between the clans when Armin was 15, just after the engagement was broken. The 'Rough Time' Jean refers to (that we'll talk more about later) was between the deaths and Eren traveling with his father. 
> 
> Armin and Sasha are 18  
> Mikasa, Jean, and Connie are 19  
> Eren is 20


	3. Run Away, Away With Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we go into the past to walk with Armin and Eren. It's a vastly different experience than the not that low key flirtfest that was Jean and Marco. (Also a not all that hidden Levi reference.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A shorter chapter because, frankly, it was either this or a fifteen+ pager. But, as an apology for the shortness, a Friday update instead of a Monday one! ...that balances out right?

When the last of the pups had been picked up by their parents and everything put away and cleaned up for the day Armin was more than ready to head home. Or, more accurately, head to Jean’s cabin and make his apologies for upsetting the other omega. He was hoping that Jean would be so annoyed about being given an escort that he would have mostly forgotten that Armin had gotten under his skin.

He’d hung by the window long enough to watch Mr. Yeager and Erwin finish up their talk then head into the First Alpha’s home. Eren had gone in the opposite direction, towards the creek and the family cabins and, with nothing left to watch, Armin had gotten back to work tending to the pups.

He wasn’t above admitting that it was easier without Jean skulking around with a veritable rain cloud over his head.

Now the sun was down, the stars were starting to dot the sky, and the moon hung half full above them. It was, unfortunately, even colder out than it had been that morning. He wasn’t looking forward to the walk home and was even considering shifting to make it less of a hassle when he stepped out of the nursery and collided with a bored looking Eren.

They both reacted at the same time; Armin put his hands up against Eren’s chest, intending to push himself away and hands came up and caught his forearms as if to hold him steady.Neither of them ended up moving at all and Armin was just standing there, right against Eren’s chest, breathing in the scent of wet earth and rust.

Eren’s hand shifted and fingertips brushed his neck then touched the length of leather cord that hung around his neck; Armin shivered and swallowed, trying to wet his suddenly dry throat.

“You cold?” Eren asked. Armin glanced up and found himself looking up into green eyes that seemed to catch the light and glow. Eren’s hair was longer than Armin remembered, but no less unruly, his skin a little lighter from lack of time outdoors, shoulders a little wider and-

Eren was breathtaking.

And staring at him expectantly. Armin flushed and shook his head. "I’m fine.”

Eren nodded then stepped back, hands dropping to his sides. Armin tried not to let his disappointment show. “I’m walking you home so if you’re all done?”

Walking him home? He hadn’t an official escort in months; usually he went places with Jean and on the rare occasion he was alone it wasn’t as if anyone really bothered him. Sometimes he ventured over the bridge to where the bachelor alphas were to deliver messages or water but other than some eyeroll worthy catcalling and one or two alphas who’d gotten handsy (and regretted it shortly thereafter) nothing happened.

“Why?”

“Because you have a half dozen visiting suitors and it would be inappropriate to let you wander around unescorted at night.” Eren said it like he was repeating something he found particularly stupid then squinted at him through the darkness. “You _still_ have every asshole from every other backwoods pack around the country coming to see you?”

Armin rolled his eyes then brushed past Eren, maybe making more contact than was strictly needed. He wanted to point out that it wasn’t _every_  asshole, just all the ones he had no interest in, and that if Eren didn’t spend all of his time elsewhere he’d know that yes, there were still people coming around. Some more than once, thinking that time had improved their chances.

Hoping he was getting tired of waiting for whatever he was waiting for.

“All these people here, desperately sniffing around, so maybe you’ll choose them and for what? Just so you’ll have their pups, like it’s a badge of honor.” Eren continued; the venom in his voice was almost as surprising as his words.

"That's how it's always been." It seemed like a hollow justification and, really, it was. It wasn't like Armin was thrilled by it all because he wasn't but how he felt about it wouldn't change things. "You know that." 

“It’s fucking gross.”

Armin reached up to push his hair back, fingers twining in the ends as he considered the alpha’s words. Had he forgotten that a few years ago he’d been the one supposed to be in the position to court him, to be his mate and father his children? Was that something that had always been so unappealing to him and Armin hadn’t ever realized it? Had he been thinking about a future together while Eren was wrinkling his nose in disgust and hoping for a way out?

Maybe Eren really couldn’t see him in ‘that way’ at all, not even with other people. Maybe he'd always resented not having a choice in the matter. 

“It won’t matter if Erwin has pups of his own.” He said after what was probably too long a pause to seem as unbothered as he wanted to. Not that it mattered since Eren was clinically oblivious to what other people were feeling, or, at least, that's how it seemed. 

He could hear Eren crunching through the snow behind him, just close enough that he could see his shadow from the corner of his eye. “Erwin is never breeding.”

“Don’t say that.” Armin frowned at the thought. Erwin finding a mate and breeding was, without exaggeration, the best thing that could possibly happen to him aside from Eren deciding to court him. Everyone interested in him solely for the shot at attaining a favorable position in the clan would vanish like they’d ever been there at all if Erwin had children of his own. Succession would stay within his uncle's line and he'd just be a normal unmmated omega. 

“It’s true.” Eren insisted. “He doesn’t care about that kind of thing and he’ll be more than happy to turn over power to your kid one day.”

“What makes you say that?” Armin asked, tone sharper than he wanted it to be. 

He’d been holding out hope that Erwin would, eventually, take a mate. It wasn’t like there weren’t a lot of interested omegas and breeding betas around, many traveling to the clan's lands with their parents in hopes of an audience with the First Alpha. Armin supposed they were in similar positions in that regard, except there would be less pressure on Erwin.

He had an entire pack to lead after all and wouldn’t be the first leader to allow someone else from the line to take over when the time came. Alphas deciding not to breed wasn’t common but it wasn’t completely unheard of or thought of as badly as an omega doing the same.

Still he’d hoped. It wasn’t as if it was totally outside the realm of possibility that, eventually, someone would catch his uncle’s eye.

Or maybe it was.

“He and my dad talk. I listen.”

He bit the inside of his cheek again, hard enough to draw blood, and pushed out an annoyed breath through his nose. If that was true it was just more pressure on him to find someone, to make a choice.

He was tired of all of it. The whispers, the looks, the not at all subtle remarks and questions about why he hadn’t found a mate yet, the outside pressure, the waiting for something that, he seemed, shouldn’t have been waiting on at all.

All anyone else cared about was power, bloodlines, succession lines, and he had never cared much about any of it. He knew it was a big deal, that the perception of strong leaders kept outsiders from challenging their alpha and that bloodlines were important to that perception. Allies were made and kept, bonds between the packs solidified through marriage and blood, and it was all...just a lot and somehow it seemed his options were narrowing even further.

“That’s the present I sent you?” Eren asked. Armin looked down and saw that he had drawn the double wing charm out from under his shirt and was rubbing his thumb over the ridged metal anxiously.

It had become a strange sort of nervous gesture in the months since he’d gotten it.

He forced himself to smile. He didn’t want to fight now that he and Eren were actually talking and it wasn’t as if his problems needed to be on the other man’s shoulders. His place in the pack, and everything that came with it, was his to deal with and it was obvious Eren wanted nothing to do with any of it.

“Yeah. I had a hard time convincing my grandfather that it wasn’t a courting gift and that it was fine for me to keep and wear.” It had gotten even worse when the Christmas gift had followed. It wasn’t as if his grandfather didn’t like Eren, because he liked him a lot, but there was a way of doing things and sending courting gifts directly to someone wasn’t it.

It had taken a lot of work to get his grandfather to accept that there was more to life than mating and courting and that maybe it was just his friend doing something nice for him.

Even if he’d hoped otherwise.

"Good." Eren smiled back. “There was this guy who lived a few hours outside of the Underground with his pup-"

He just bit back a noise of surprise at hearing that they'd been out in the west. The Underground was exactly what it sounded like, a series of underground tunnels and dens where a dozen or so smaller and weaker western packs and families had come together to escape the harsher conditions of their lands and the wild packs that roamed it. Everyone talked about how near to feral the packs out in the west were, supposed human eaters and even cannibals, who obeyed only the very old ways of fighting for what was yours and killing for what wasn't.

That was the sort of thing most of the eastern packs had left behind in favor of succession, settling down and developing lands, forming bonds and making allies, and in trade and bartering among each other. The Underground was right on the edge of the east and west, as close to civilized as things got out there, but supposedly the roaming packs sometimes invaded their walls, bring death and sickness with them, before vanishing back into the Forest of Giant Trees that surrounded the canyon the Underground had been carved right into the side of. 

"He wasn’t really part of the packs, I guess, because he wouldn’t come in to get looked at even though he was sick we we had to go out to him and then he threatened to slit Marco’s throat- You know I always thought Jean was the most stubborn and foul mouthed omega in the world but this guy…”

Armin looked down and tried to remember if he’d ever heard Eren refer to Jean, or anyone, as their dynamic before.

“Anyway, I guess he’s a metalsmith and usually does weapons, gave dad a pretty nice looking knife, but he said he could make whatever to pay for his treatment...so I asked for this.”

Armin rubbed his finger over the charm again. “Thank you.”

“Yeah well.” Eren rubbed the back of his neck and looked down at the ground. “I was worried, I had to draw it and you know I’m not any good at that kind of thing and he only had a few days to do it before we were headed back east-”

“It’s great.” And it was, even if he found he understood Eren even less now. Knowing that he’d sort of gone out of his way to have someone make the charm for him...it stroked that part inside of him that wanted to believe there was more to it than just a nice gesture between friends even as the more logical part of his brain told him to stop being so stupid.

He could hear Jean, exasperated with everything, telling him once again to just let it go. Move on from whatever was keeping him tethered to Eren and, if he was so inclined, consider one of the other suitors interested in him.  

He closed his hand around the charm and cord, throat so tight he could barely breath.

“I’m glad.” There was a warmth to Eren’s voice that made his heart clench almost painfully. “I uh...I know we haven’t really...talked much. Lately.”

Armin snorted softly. “I’m not sure the past three years can really be called ‘lately’.”

The words were out there, hanging heavy between them before he could stop them. Eren’s eyes widened slightly and Armin wanted to take them back, to apologize and say it was nothing because Eren was there now and… But it wasn’t true. Eren had up and left after the engagement had been broken and Armin could understand that he probably hadn’t had much choice in the matter but contact had dropped to almost nothing. No letters, barely speaking when Eren was on clan grounds, walking past each other without a word and never anything resembling an explanation.

It had hurt. 

Still hurt. 

Eren looked away first. “Armin-”

He sighed. “I don’t want to fight.”

That got him a flicker of a smile in response. He’d never been much for fighting and especially not with Eren. There had never been much need to though, Eren had generally been happy to defer to what he wanted to do and on the rare occasion he hadn’t Armin had always been willing to compromise without much fuss.

“I’ve been a jerk.” Eren hesitated over the last word then frowned like he wished he’d said something else. “But we won’t be leaving again until after the spring mating and birthing season so I thought we could hang out. If you wanted to.”

“You’re leaving again?” He hated himself for how small his voice sounded. “So soon?”

Eren looked surprised for just a second then words began to spill out, tone oddly placating. “It’s not that soon. Probably the beginning of June so we can stay the whole season since Mikasa’s pups are due towards the end. Then we’ll go around to the Northern allied packs and check out their new pups but we won’t be helping with birthing or anything so it’ll be fast, we’d be back by the summer season to help with putting up new cabins for courting pairs and the late harvest.”

He muttered his understanding. He did understand, really. The other clans needed medical care and Grisha needed to train someone to take over for him eventually and it looked like Eren was it. Helping the clan with things throughout the year, like the harvest, was crucial to their ability to remain mostly cut-off from the humans. They traded with their ally clans, accepted labor and supplies from them in exchange for having Grisha visit a few times a year, and it was a careful kind of balance.

Everyone had their roles to play to make their world work and Eren was playing his.

Armin let go of the charm.

“That sounds good.”

Eren looked so relieved it was almost comical.

The next few minutes were spent talking about some of the places Eren had seen while he was in the west. The great stretching green moors, forests full of gigantic trees, an endless desert where the wild packs kept to during the winter (that Eren admittedly hadn't seen but some people in the underground claimed was out there once you went past the forest and it was probably true), and the handful of human settlements they’d traveled through along the way when they couldn't avoid them.

“You should see it all.” Eren looked...happy. Armin watched him from the corner of his eyes and couldn't help but see the smile and the bright eyes. He tried, and failed, to think of the last time he'd seen Eren look so happy; it had to have been sometime before his mother died. It was obvious that the alpha genuinely enjoyed traveling with his father. 

Armin had grown up listening to his carrier talk about the lands to the north with the great snow capped mountains, the sea and, when you went north enough, the ice floes and glaciers you could see out on the water, the hot springs, and the animals that thrived there. He’d always dreamed about going there, eventually, and not just north, but all over. He had shelves full of books about the country and other places, far off across the ocean, and he and Eren had sat side by side and looked at it all, reverently touching glossy pictures while they talked in hushed voices about the things they would see.

Realistically, however, there wasn’t any reason for him to ever leave their territory unless he were to marry outside of the clan and his mate was too established elsewhere to come to him but even that was unlikely. Any children he had would need to be born and raised on their lands for the sake of succession.  

Eren bumped him lightly with his shoulder. “You should come with us when we go.”

Armin blinked. “What? I can’t-”

“Why not?” Eren interrupted, eyes bright. “You’re good with people and pups so that would be a big help. Marco is good with kids too but he makes adults nervous and...well. But you’re unmated, no kids, not really courting right? So what’s keeping you here?”

“All of those things?” He kept his tone light even though he felt the weight of it pressing in on him. Eren waved a hand dismissively.  

“Forget that. Think of all the things we could see and do. I could take you to the ocean.” Eren reached out and squeezed his hand. It was just for a moment but after he pulled away the feeling of rough hands and inviting heat lingered. “That’s what we always talked about when we were younger, so why not now? Why should you have to sit here doing nothing when I could show you so much other stuff?”

His heart fluttered. “I’ll think about it?”

Eren’s wide smile felt like some kind of reward.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter: We get to see what all this business about Armin's grandfather finding him a mate is all about. Jean realizes he's caught up in it as well and is about as happy about it as you'd expect. 
> 
> Raya's Actual Wolf World Things: There are lots of wolf packs out there. Some blend in with humans, grouped together in certain neighborhoods in larger cities, but this is rare. Along the Eastern Coast most of the packs are allied through marriages and trade; Grisha travels through the packs near constantly after his wife's death, rendering medical care and doing a little rudimentary training to those interested. It's about 8 weeks to go north and back and 8 to go south and back, and that's just hitting the biggest packs along the most direst route. Before Carla was killed he would break up the trips more, going one way and then remaining in the midlands for a few months before going the other way. 
> 
> To the West things are...different. Nomadic packs for the most part, moving with the seasons, save the Underground where those who lacked packs or were exiled or just found their packs thinned by illness and violence have flocked together. Generally weak, poor, and superstitious. The first alpha before Erwin forbid contact but Erwin, being the enterprising First with ideas of uniting as many wolves as possible, has his sights set on bringing the Underground into the Alliance (starting with sending Grisha around to provide aid). The nomad packs are scattered and unconnected so they stay out of the East because, while they could probably pick off some of the border packs, no one nomad pack could hope to survive a fight against such a united front. 
> 
> (It's a whole world you guys! *throws down pages and pages of notes* A. Whole. World.)


	4. The Story's Over Now, The End

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Summary: Armin, and by proxy Jean, end up fucked and not at all in the way either of them would prefer. Or at least not the way Armin would probably be down with if the right person approached him. Jean is above such things. Of course. *cough*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last chapter was short so super rapid update!

Armin decided to bypass Jean’s place and just head home in the end. Eren and Jean could be a volatile mix depending on the circumstances. They’d always been that way, first because Eren had seemed to take some things about Jean’s nature extremely personal then because of Jean’s obvious crush on Mikasa and a lot of other little things they’d never seen fit to explain to Armin.

He wasn’t sure where they stood these days. They’d gone from snapping at each other to actually fighting after Eren’s mother had died, though Eren had been fighting just about everyone and everything that moved at that point, and he’d never been able to tell if it had all smoothed over or they just pretended to be tolerant when they had to. 

Either way it was probably a better idea to just head home and go out by himself later that night. He’d asked Jean once and had gotten a flinty look and ‘Does Eren have any friends anymore?’ as a response.

His grandfather was inside standing over the stove, stirring something with one hand and frowning at a paper he was holding in the other. He set it down, looking surprised when he realized that Armin was in the company of someone other than Jean, but it quickly melted into a wide smile. 

“Eren! How long has it been this time?” He said as he walked over and hustled them in then started steering Eren towards the table in the main room. “You two have great timing. I just finished dinner so sit down and tell us everything.” 

Eren laughed even as he shook his head. “I can’t really stay. I need to check on Marco.” 

“Marco?” His grandfather asked. He’d clearly heard what Eren had said yet he didn’t stop pushing Eren forward. Eren shot Armin an amused look over his shoulder as a chair was tugged out for him.  

“He’s my dad’s other apprentice. His grandmother was friends with my mother’s father.” Armin expected to see pain or sadness at the mention of Eren’s mother but there was only a slight softening of his smile. “He came back with us but he walked Jean home. I should make sure he hasn’t lost his eye or worse.”

Armin’s grandfather laughed. “Nothing to be worried about then, Jean probably picked him apart and made him run for the hills. Might as well stay and have some soup.” 

Eren’s eyebrows went up. Armin wasn’t sure that thought process worked out either but his grandfather could be eccentric at times and it wasn’t as if Eren leaving was something he wanted to happen. 

He took off his cloak and shoes then, with an apologetic look he hoped looked genuine in Eren’s direction, went to join his grandfather by the stove. The older man was juggling bowls and mugs while trying to nudge the oven door closed with his foot. 

Armin tried to reach for the dishes in his hand but his grandfather ducked away, frowning. “Go sit. I’m not so old I can’t manage dinner on my own.” 

Eren snorted from behind them. Armin glared over his shoulder then looked back at the older man, hesitating. Any time an alpha had come by for a (supervised) meal before he’d been expected to do everything to show he had the skills needed to keep a home. 

But, he realized as he finally relented and headed back to Eren, this wasn’t like that. This wasn’t a visiting alpha interested in him and he wasn’t expected to make himself seem worthy or desirable. It was just Eren and dinner like they’d done so many times when his parents and Mrs. Yeager had still been alive. 

Eren was looking around the room when he sat down across from him. Armin looked as well though he knew there wasn’t much to see really. 

The cabin was the same style as almost all the other ones, a large main room, a bedroom to the left, and a smaller bedroom and washing room to the right. The main room was totally open, separated into smaller areas by the sparse furniture. The stove, water pump and sink, and pantry were in the very front, the dining table and chairs were directly across from that, and more chairs and a low table were set up around the fireplace at the back. There was a ladder that lead up to the loft above the sitting area but they’d never had much use for it beyond storing winter clothing in the warmer months. 

The floors were bare, save a small round rug in the sitting area, and there were shelves full of books built along one of the walls. It was all clean and neat, everything in it’s place. Even the quilts they kept out in the main room were folded and stacked under the coffee table, waiting to be used.  

It wasn’t any different than Eren’s family cabin, save that the loft had been where Eren slept after Mikasa joined the pack.

He looked back at Eren, heart stuttering when he realized the brunette’s focus had shifted to him. It wasn’t a nice look but it was an intense one; brows knitting together, bright green eyes sharp and intent under the messy curtain of Eren’s hair, mouth pressed into a thin line. A rush of heat flowed through Armin and he was sure his heart was beating loud enough for everyone to hear. 

Eren cocked his head to the side. He looked like he was going to say something, before he could, a basket of rolls was dropped onto the table between them. Armin jumped then laughed nervously at the look his grandfather shot him. 

They ate without any more strange looks, thankfully, and Eren answered the many questions Armin’s grandfather peppered him with. Curiosity was a family trait as far as Armin could tell, passed from his grandfather to his father to him, but Eren handled it all with a smile and the same enthusiasm he’d showed on the walk over. 

It reminded Armin of when they’d been young and his grandfather had been the one coming back from somewhere far away. He’d come to visit three times a year, times that Armin now realized must have coincided with his carrier’s heats, and they’d crowd around to hear stories about the northern wolf packs, the northern humans, the lands, and anything else they could think to ask about. 

He found himself smiling, content to listen and let the nostalgic feeling warm him, until:

“Mr. Arlert I think you should let Armin come to the north when we go after the birthing season.” 

“Eren!”

“Oh?”

Eren’s eyes darted over to him for a heartbeat; he’d looked nervous at first but then he was the stubborn boy Armin had grown up with, resolute and ready to argue for what he wanted. And then throw a tantrum when he didn’t. Armin hoped frantically that Eren was well and truly out of the tantrum stage.

“His help would be appreciated. A lot of omegas and betas aren’t comfortable being looked at by an unmated alpha after they’ve given birth so even though I could do the exams myself I can’t. If Armin came with us we could get things done in half the time by seeing more people at a time.” 

Armin blinked; when Eren had said he’d be ‘useful’ he’d thought it was just something he was saying in the moment but now it sounded like he’d given it some real thought. 

His grandfather hummed thoughtfully then nodded slowly. “I’ll consider it.” 

“You will?” Armin asked, eyes going round in surprise. Eren looked smug. His grandfather’s smile was an amused one. 

“Of course. I trust Eren and Grisha to keep an eye on you and helping out with pack affairs when we can is our duty.” Amused as he sounded his words were shaping up to become the speech Armin had heard every time he’d rejected a suitor. Duty, pack responsibility, doing what he was supposed to do for the sake of everyone. 

The usual speech didn’t follow however. Instead there were cookies from Jean’s mother, some idle talk about Eren’s upcoming birthday while his grandfather did dishes and then headed to the sitting area to read while they talked. It was easy once he forced himself to not linger on the things that made his breath catch and heart beat harder and stopped feeling like he was going to catch fire every time Eren’s knee brushed his own.

It was almost like being friends before he’d started noticing Eren filling out from skinny and awkward to something else completely (but still occasionally awkward.) and everything had gotten so messed up.

All too soon Eren was glancing down at his watch and realizing his father would be back at the cabin and he really needed to go. Armin saw him out, saying nothing about the handful of cookies Eren liberated on the way, and hung by the door until the other man melted into the darkness. When he turned around it was to find himself pinned under a strangely soft look. 

“Armin come sit with me.” 

He approached warily, sure he was about to be told he wasn’t allowed to see Eren alone or something like that. When he’d sat down, legs curled up in the seat and feet underneath him, his grandfather took a breath, visibly steeling himself, then flashed him a soothing smile. 

Armin was immediately suspicious. Nothing good had ever followed a look like that, not ever. His loved his grandfather and was grateful for everything he’d done for him since his parents had died. He’d traveled away from his home to take care of him and had never, as far as Armin could tell, done anything he didn’t believe to be in his best interests. He’d pushed for him to have a choice, even if it hadn’t really been what Armin had wanted, and to be able to do as he pleased without judgement and there weren’t words for how much he appreciated that. 

He’d gotten something omegas didn’t usually get once they were old enough to breed: a chance to be himself without a mate or pups to look after. Most of the time he felt like that was a good thing.

But he was still suspicious of his grandfather’s expression. 

Maybe he was spending too much time with Jean and all the other omega’s chronic disappointment in the world was starting to rub off on him. 

“I’ve found you a mate.” 

Somewhere Jean was making his ‘I told you so’ face. 

No, that wasn’t right. Not even Jean would try to get smug about something like this.

Armin’s mouth dropped open. His grandfather reached out across the gap between their chairs to put a hand on his shoulder, clearly meant to be a comforting gesture and yet Armin felt oddly trapped. 

Or, maybe, like his entire world was falling away underneath his seat. 

“You...you what?” He couldn’t possibly have heard that correctly. Not ‘I found another acceptable suitor’ but Mate? As in final decision already made, this is what is happening, this is who you’re going to be with?

It wasn’t...couldn’t be. 

“There was an offer from the clan your carrier and I came from. His name is Nile Dok and he’s from this pack originally but mated with a woman from that clan and moved north.” 

Armin, absurdly, found himself concentrating on the name above everything else. Nile Dok? The only Dok he could remember was Widow Dok and she’d passed away...eight years ago, at least. 

“It was before you were born.” His heart, if possible, sank more. Before he was born? That meant this man was, literally, old enough to be his father. “His mate died over the summer and left behind some pups but they’re all older and don’t need much care from a carrier. He’s looking for someone smart, kind, independent, and more mature than single carriers tend to be who can understand what his pups are going through. He’s done a lot for the northern clan over the years and he’s from a good old bloodline that can be traced to this clan’s roots.” 

His grandfather was watching him very intently and using the same tone of voice he’d used when telling him his engagement to Eren was being reconsidered, like he was a skittish rabbit who might bolt at any moment. 

Which wasn’t all that crazy a thought. The door looked very tempting but his feet were refusing to respond to his desire to be...anywhere else. 

“You’ll have a lot of freedom to do what you want. In fact that’s what he wants, someone who can tend to things on their own and won’t need an alpha around all of the time.” The hand on his shoulder squeezed lightly. “He’s a good man, I promise you, and I wouldn’t have considered accepting the offer otherwise. You’ll finally be able go north like you’ve wanted, at least until you’re with child. Then you’ll be need to come back to raise them as part of the clan, assuming Erwin hasn’t bred, but that’s to be expected and Nile would remain in the north. You could pick up your life here without issue.” 

He blinked owlishly, confused for a moment and then the pieces slid into place. A mating of convenience. Nile would get someone to care for his children and home plus a connection to one of the next heads of the largest pack in the country and Armin, and the pack, would get a legitimate heir, complete with a sire originally from the pack, and then he’d be allowed to return his own devices without his mate under the guise of raising his pup on clan lands. 

It wasn’t, from a logical perspective, all that bad of a arrangement. 

He was going to be sick. 

“Erwin is already considering the matter and I see no reason he won’t give his approval-”

Armin could barely hear his grandfather over the pounding of blood in his ears. It sounded like everything was already planned out and set in stone without any input from him. It had even gone as far as the First Alpha before he’d so much as been informed. He was supposed to be able to choose, that was the whole point of breaking the engagement to Eren, and now he didn’t even get to decide where he lived? 

“And I’ll be talking to Jean’s parents soon.”

That cut through the haze and brought him firmly into the present. “What about Jean?” 

“He agreed to be your second.” His grandfather said, slipping into his ‘teaching’ voice. “If Jean is going to be Second Omega one day he’ll be expected to go with you, of course. Staying at your side unless you need him to represent the pack in your place elsewhere is what he’s supposed to do.” 

“Jean hates the cold.” Armin blurted. It was stupid, so very stupid, but it was all he could begin to grasp onto firmly. Everything else was a mess of confusion and questions but he knew, without a doubt, that Jean would hate living in the north. 

“They have fireplaces there.” His grandfather looked at him like he wasn’t making any sense.  

Armin went silent; he may well not have been making any sense but he found himself still strangely preoccupied with how much Jean despised everything dealing with snow and ice. He’d already been acting like the latest storm was some kind of personal offence against him; the harsh winters of the north would be like hell to Jean.  

He would never forgive him. 

“It won’t be permanent. Once conception if confirmed you’ll both come home.” 

Armin’s hands curled into fists at the thought. He shook his head to banish it.

“I’m getting older and it’s only a matter of time-”

He brushed the older beta’s hand away already knowing what was coming next and wanting no part of it. His carrier had been a later in life pup for his grandfather, an only child, and Armin himself had come along when his parents had been mated for nearly a decade and after few rough pregnancies that had ended tragically. His grandfather was...older, yes, but lately he’d been acting like he had a foot in the grave half the time and Armin wasn’t interested in hearing any more about it. 

“It’s only a matter of time before I’m not here anymore.” His grandfather didn’t so much as hesitate in continuing. “I want to know you’re going to be taken care of. This way the pack will take care of you no matter what might happen.” 

“I can take care of myself!” He shouted then bit down on his lip hard, trying to force back the anger he could feel bubbling up. It wouldn’t help anything; getting angry and shouting like a child was unbecoming of an omega of his status and, as the thought came, he just wanted to yell again. 

He didnt. 

Instead he kept his voice even and settled for glaring at his hands darkly. “You said you wanted me to pick.” 

How could his grandfather be doing this?

“Armin,” There was that voice again. “It’s been almost four years and you’ve rejected everyone who has come your way. It’s very clear to everyone you have no intention of actually choosing a suitor.”

He opened his mouth then shut it, unable to so much as argue the point. It was true, he’d been going along with the courting because he had to but he’d never actually given anyone serious consideration. He’d never intended to do so and it made shame twist in his gut. 

“I know you’ve been waiting for Eren.” Armin groaned and put a hand over his eyes, digging the heel in to try to stop the burning there. His grandfather’s sigh sounded as hurt as Armin felt. “I understand you care about him and that you have been friends for years but he’s had all the time in the world and hasn’t shown interest and you simply can’t wait forever.” 

And why couldn’t he was what Armin wanted to demand but he knew the answer and what was the point in rehashing the same things he’d been told his entire life?

“You have a responsibility to your pack and you can’t keep delaying for the sake of a childhood crush.”

He licked his lips, willing himself to speak around the hard lump in his throat, to defend everything he’d done, all the suitors he’d rejected. It wasn’t just a crush; he’d had a few crushes (his feelings for Eren hadn’t rendered him blind) but it wasn’t the same and that was why it always came back to Eren. 

It wasn’t just that Eren was attractive but that, once, Armin would have said that they knew each other better than anyone else did. That he could trust and rely on Eren, that his friend didn’t judge him or want him to be anything other than what he was. 

Because Eren had always been there to protect him and encourage him and share his dreams of going places one day. Because even when Eren had been hurting after his mother had been killed he’d been there for Armin at first, before everything had changed between them, held his hand when the bodies had been burned and slept in his bed like they were kids and held him while he cried. Even when Eren had been so angry that he’d been ready to fight everyone and everything, and had done just that, he’d always showed up outside of his window at night already cleaned, patched up, and smiling because he didn’t want Armin to see him hurt.

Because even though he’d hurt him sitting and talking to him for hours still felt like the most natural thing in the world, as if no time had passed at all. 

Because...Eren was Eren. 

Those words wouldn’t come no matter how he tried to force himself. Instead there was just silence and his grandfather’s sympathetic look. He blinked back the burning in his eyes and shook thoughts of Eren away. There was no explaining any of that. 

“What if I say no?”

His grandfather touched his shoulder again. “Then I’ll decline the offer but you need to understand that everyone has their place in the pack and that includes you. I had hoped you would find someone on your own but if that isn’t the case then someone who wants so little of you seems to be the best alternative.”

Something hot and furious flared in Armin’s chest; he didn’t want an alternative. He didn’t want any of  _ this _ . He’d never wanted it.

It smothered just as quickly as it’d burst to life under the ever present reminder that what, who, he wanted didn’t seem to want him and that his obligation to the pack didn’t change just because he wanted Eren. 

“If you don’t decline I’ll send the acceptance message, assuming Erwin approves, at the first thaw. When the Yeagers go north after the birth season you can go along as far as your mate’s home if you wish, or we’ll travel ourselves after your next heat is done.”

He closed his eyes and swallowed back the taste of bile. He’d be allowed to go with Eren for the first leg of the trip north, finally leave the clan’s grounds like they’d talked about. Armin saw it for the peace offering it was. A childhood wish granted before he had to accept all the adult duties he’d been avoiding. 

“I’m going to stay at Jean’s tonight.” He was on his feet before the words were even all the way out of his mouth. He didn’t wait for approval, out the door and plunging into the frigid darkness even though he could hear his grandfather calling for him to come back.

\---

“The fucking north.” Jean said once he’d finished teasing his friend about his ‘mystery alpha’ and finally settled down enough to get the whole story out. Armin felt calmer once it was done. Still bristling with anger and on the verge of being sick but he felt like he could breathe and think clearly again. 

He nodded. Jean’s hands dug into the coat still sitting in his lap; he’d been holding on it to the entire time though Armin didn’t think he was actually aware of it. It was weird, less because of the action since it wasn’t as if crossing paths with someone and being drawn to their scent was a strange occurrence, (He'd heard of people who'd decided to go ahead and mate for no other reason that being drawn to each other's scents. He was tempted to scoff but when he thought about Eren, rust and wet earth and sharp and  _alpha_ he supposed he could see where people could get caught up) and more because Jean had never seemed like that sort of person.

Certainly not the kind of take comfort from having a death grip on some strange alpha's coat. He'd been mostly convinced that Jean wasn't actually attracted to alphas (a strange trait in an omega but Armin wouldn't have judged) since he seemed to dislike even having to associate with most of them and had never seemed all that inclined to give any of them a second look (aside from his illfated crush on Mikasa.) 

As if he could hear his thoughts Jean’s hands opened up and, frowning distractedly, he smoothed out the wrinkles in the fabric. “Well you’ll just have to get knocked up right away. We could be back before winter.” 

“I’m not getting pregnant so you don’t have to deal with the cold.” 

He half expected Jean to get mad but instead there was just a small upwards twitch of his lips. “Obviously. What are you planning to do?”

“Do?” That was a loaded question if ever there was one.

“Yeah. Are you going to run off to play doctor with Yeager or what?” 

Armin laughed because if he didn’t he was sure he was going to start crying. He shouldn’t have even told Jean about that part, it wasn’t as if it could really happen. Not like he’d hoped anyway. “No. I’m not going to do anything.” 

Jean’s brow furrowed. “What do you mean you’re not going to do anything? You’re just going to get mated off to some guy who you’ve never met and is old enough to be your father? After all this time hoping Eren gets a clue you’re just giving up right when it seems like he isn’t a total waste of space? What the fuck?”

Armin bypassed the insults, knowing that was Jean-speak for ‘I’m very concerned about you right now and only know how to express that by being an ass.’ And maybe a little ‘If I have to move north I will kill you, don’t fuck this up.’

“Didn’t you want me to get over Eren and just pick someone else?” He was unable to keep the acid from his voice or stop himself from taking a little satisfaction in the way Jean flinched. 

“Because telling you to stop torturing yourself over that idiot and to find someone you want to be with is the same as what’s happening now.” Jean’s expression could only be described as murderous as he rolled to his feet and started pacing the length of the room. 

Armin rubbed at his eyes as the pleasure in his friend’s reaction ebbed away. Lashing out wasn’t going to help. “I’m sorry.” 

Jean started muttering, something disparaging about his intelligence probably, but Armin tuned it out for a moment, staring up at the beams that ran from one side of the small space to the other without really seeing them. 

He didn’t know what Jean wanted him to do. He could refuse to get married but he wasn’t sure how that would go over or what would really be gained from it. It had to be done eventually and, unless he found someone he really wanted to be with, it wasn’t as if a better arrangement would come his way. 

At least like this he could what was required of him and return to his life. There was some merit in that wasn’t there?

Thinking of his inevitable marriage and children as part of an ‘arrangement’ made his skin crawl but was it so different than his first engagement? Did knowing Eren beforehand make that much of a difference between one arranged mating and another? 

He wanted to believe it did.

He could run away but if he did that he’d be leaving everything behind, maybe including Eren. But then again maybe not. Probably not. Eren would, honestly, probably be the first person in line to help him. Or second if he was going to give Jean half the credit he was owed as a friend. Mikasa too, though he wouldn’t ask it of her now that she had a family of her own.

Everyone and everything else however would be forfeit. He would let the pack down, shift what had been his role since birth off onto Erwin who was already First Alpha and running a pack that shouldn’t have been his to run in the first place. He didn’t think he’d be able to live with himself knowing he’d pushed a situation he felt was bad enough to run away from onto someone else. 

And if neither of them had children then what? The pack had an old fashioned alpha brawl until one person was left standing. Anyone and everyone who was interested could come out for the brawl, even from the west, and even up taking control based on strength and brutality alone.

That was the way things had been done before and all of the packs they were allied with had done away with that practice, deciding it did nothing but put people with, potentially, no idea how to lead in charge and lead to the thinning of strong alphas when, inevitably, death challenges were issued. 

Avoiding that was why they had succession lines. 

If he looked at it without emotion, which wasn’t the easiest thing, he could see all of the benefits and couldn’t come up with something more ideal (and attainable) easily. If he was even more pragmatic he could see where, after four years with no progress, his grandfather would be concerned. There was a history of issues with conceiving and carrying children in his family; his grandmother and grandfather had tried for a very long time before having his father and his father had suffered through a lot of miscarriages both before and after Armin’s birth. 

The ‘problem’ may have gone even further back than that. It was unusual for wolves to only have one child but it seemed to have been a trend on his carrier’s side of the family for more than a few generations. 

The same issues could easily plague him as well. Waiting until he was older and potentially less fertile or less healthy wasn’t going to make things any better or easier. There was sense there.

That didn’t stop him from feeling like he’d been betrayed and drowning in how not right it felt. Had he really done everything he’d been told, strived to keep his parents and then his grandfather and the pack happy just to be suck in an engagement he didn’t want? To have a child as if it were a business negotiation? 

To have his first time be with someone he wouldn’t even meet beforehand? 

He wasn’t a romantic, and wouldn’t Jean scoff at that, so he understood that ‘purity’ had more to do with being sure about bloodlines in pups than anything else and yet the thought still burned. His virginity was going to be another part of the business transaction, bartered away as part of a deal, something else he wasn’t going to be able to have say in.

Or maybe he could. 

The thought flickered, a hazy half formed thing. He considered it, turned it over in his head, considered the risks and the benefits, concluded it was stupid and selfish, then rolled over so he could see Jean standing next to the stove, glaring mutinously at his tea kettle. 

“Jean.” Brown eyes darted over to him and an eyebrow raised questioningly. “I’m going to take all of your advice.” 

Armin watched the emotions play across Jean’s face; confused, startled, annoyed, before settling on something that was equal parts disbelief and horrified amusement. “Please tell me you’re planning on running away and not the other thing.” 

“I’m going to sleep with Eren.” 

He wasn’t sure how he would make that work just yet because if Eren wasn’t interested in courting what were the odds he’d want to actually have sex? Probably low but he had time to figure it out since Eren seemed sure he wouldn’t be leaving again until after the end of the spring breeding season. 

That was time to come up with a plan and enact it. He wasn’t going to be asking for a lifetime commitment so maybe that would improve his chances and if it didn’t then the situation remained the same as it was now, nothing lost or gained. Either way Eren was going to be out of reach soon, it didn’t matter much if it was because Armin was married to someone else or because Eren rejected him. 

“Oh. Okay then.” Jean’s voice was devoid of all emotion. “That seems like a genuinely good idea and I can’t possibly imagine how it would turn out badly at all.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Chapter: Jean hates his friends and needs some new ones. Marco is free. Marco has zero interest in being Jean's 'friend'. Jean is having a 'fuck it' kind of day. ...Is that a pun?


	5. You're Sugar (Yes Please)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jean is far less concerned with rules (in his own life) and more concerned with keeping his inner wolf happy. It's a lifestyle choice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes: Jean is very...wolfy? In case you all forgot this is a werewolf/wolf shifter AU since there hasn't been much emphasis on things like that. This basically sets the tone for Marco and Jean. Armin and Eren are full of pining, Marco and Jean are full of...wolf things. Or I guess Jean will be full of...nevermind. Too easy a joke. :P The point is Jean chapters will always be a little more 'wolfy'.

 

Armin’s problems were fucking up Jean’s life. He wasn’t telling that to Armin because he had a little bit of tact but he certainly thought it a lot. Not just in the sense that Jean was now well on the way to being sent north until Armin got pregnant, though that was certainly an issue, but in the present as well.

The first few days after learning that Armin was being shipped off to marry some old wolf, and that Jean would be forced to go with him, crawled by in a cramped and awkward fashion like Jean had never experienced before. Armin refused to go the hell home, apparently preferring to mope in Jean’s cabin and look depressed instead.

Refused might have been too strong a word since, as much as he complained internally, he never told Armin to leave or said anything about his presence. His friend was having a hard enough time without Jean giving him crap, even if Armin had completely fallen into being a silent glaring jerk and was forcing Jean to make some very uncomfortable choices.

The first night Jean spent in the hammock figuring Armin probably wanted the space and that, no matter the circumstances, they were much too old to be sharing a sleeping space.

When they, and all their friends, had still been pups cramming together in warm puppy piles had been acceptable. Even with the risk of Sasha kicking someone in the face, or Eren drooling all over whoever was unlucky enough to be next to him, or Franz yelping and barking in his sleep it had been something Jean had never minded that much. Looking back on it he could see that those quirks had been sort of endearing.

Well not Franz’s quirks but, that aside, they were fond memories.

Less complicated times when his biggest problem was Eren calling him a prissy whiney baby and keeping the older kids from picking on Armin and no one cared if your friends were alphas or betas or omegas and snuffling piles with awkward limbs and scents that soothed and felt like home were the norm.

But now they were older and things like that were long past.

He let Armin keep the furs and blankets and, after some internal debate, took only the quilt that his mother had made while she was carrying and that damn coat for himself. He wasn’t set up to have someone staying over, since it never happened, but the hammock was closer to the fire so he figured he’d be okay. Omegas tended to catch a chill easily  and while Jean dealt with the cold worse than anyone else they knew Armin wasn’t that much better off.

In the end the cold wasn’t the problem.

Staying up, staring at his ceiling, drowning in that burnt sugar scent however...it was the problem. He must have lost his mind to think it was a good idea to use an alpha’s jacket as a blanket because come morning he felt like Marco’s scent was clinging to his skin and hair, covering him long after he’d tossed the thing into a corner and tried to scrub himself clean of it.

Scent was a big deal with wolves. When they were young, before their eyes fully developed, scent was how they identified their sire and carrier. It was how they scented out playmates, marked their territory, identified danger and, when they were old enough, it played a role in finding a mate. If someone’s scent wasn’t right, didn’t strike the right cords, it meant something about them wasn’t right.

Meant they weren’t the right kind of person to breed with.

Eren, for example, smelled like something lickable to Armin (or so Jean gathered) but to Jean nothing had changed in the alpha’s scent since they were children. It was nice enough, strongly associated with memories of childhood and other good things, but it didn’t do anything for him beyond that.

He’d stumbled across a few people with scents that caught his attention but nothing that had really ‘gotten’ to him. He’d tried to work around it once, to just push down the prickling feeling of wrongness in the back of his mind in hopes the wolf part of him would come around, but that had gone terribly. It wasn't a mistake he'd repeat and, since then, Jean had decided to chalk not coming across a scent that caused a reaction to being sort of broken and left it at that. He didn’t let it bother him.

It sort of bothered him. 

Marco’s scent did something for him. Namely had him uncomfortably hard in his sleep pants and unable to do anything about it.

It also had him annoyed that he was reacting to Marco’s scent at all.

The second day it snowed heavily and by midday it became painfully clear to both of them that no one was coming or going for a while which meant another day, at least, stuck with a pouting Armin, who was starting to smell sour like sadness, and the coat.

He snagged a fur from the nest, wrinkling at the scent of Armin’s misery on it, and huddled under that and quilt. Tossed the fur at some point and then was up shivering all night, listening to the sound of the wind howl as ice and snow pelted his tiny cabin.

This wasn’t working.

The third day was the same as the second with Armin’s scent started making him edgy by all day, the impulse to curl around his friend and...take care of him? Share heat and scent? He wasn’t sure what it was, never having felt at all inclined to care for someone before. He had the maternal instincts of a rock; he found pups to be bewildering and the softer caring nature he was supposed to have always seemed to elude him.  

He decided to just retreat back to the hammock and go to bed early.

He tossed and turned long after Armin snuffed out the candles and crawled into his nest, still reeking strongly of upset. He dragged the blanket up over his head, trying to drown Armin out. He gave up eventually, emerging from the stifling cocoon he’d put himself in to glare over at Armin. The little blond had pouted himself right to sleep, the lucky little fuck, but that did nothing for the nose twisting sorrow that was taking over the air.

Jean slipped out of the hammock then, once again cursing that they’d been born so close together, shuffled over to snatch up the coat from the crumpled heap it had fallen into.

Lesser of two evils.

He woke up rutting against the coat. And not just that, because maybe that wouldn’t have been so horrifying, but sweaty, harder than he could remember ever being, slick coating his thighs, pants having ridden low, gasping and panting into the coat. When what he was doing sank in he toppled out of the hammock in an attempt to get away from the offended item and fell on his ass, hard.

It took a moment to collect himself, sense of smell too sharp and eyes taking in too much, fur close to bursting free as his heart thumped hard against his ribcage. He was close to shifting, something that hadn’t happened in his sleep since he was a child, and the wolf part of his brain was awake and snapping at him, unhappy as being separated from the thing they’d found that smelled so good.

The wolf wasn’t some kind of separate thing in pureblood wolves, though he’d heard that it was different for those unlucky people who’d been bitten and changed, but more like a darker and more needy part of himself. It didn’t care about rules or staying in line or not doing completely inappropriate shit; it wanted what it wanted when it wanted.

He pushed it back, shook off the change, then slumped over, tired even though he’d just woken up.

What the fuck?

Armin was already awake but had taken it upon himself to move to the corner furthest from Jean and said nothing at all when the coat was once again banished to a corner. It bothered Jean all day, taunting him, and no amount of furious glaring made him feel better about it. It wasn’t just that he’d been doing that, or even that Armin had been witness to it, but that it had happened at all.

Not just a wet dream, that he couldn’t remember at all, but that he’d basically rubbed his scent all over the coat like. Scent marking was more of an alpha habit in the first place, about marking territory and staking claims and warning other wolves off from what that alpha considered their property.

Sure he’d been asleep while doing it but it was weird. Really weird.

So Jean sat and did his best to not think while Armin barely spoke at all. It was a bad day.

The snow kept coming down.

Jean considered walking out into it and, hopefully, freezing to death.

The fourth night he gave up and crawled into the nest with Armin. After an uncomfortable moment where Armin stared at him like he’d grown a second and third head right before his eyes he wrapped an arm around his friend and hauled him closer. He rubbed his neck, specifically his scent gland, over the top of Armin’s head like his mother had done to him when he was younger.

For a long moment he thought it wasn’t going to do anything except make for a very uncomfortable night, that he was fucking it up because he had no idea if just wanting to help would help him put out the right kind of scent, but then Armin relaxed against him.

They made it work. Armin cuddled against his side, talking softly about how much he didn’t want to get married and not just because of Eren, but because it terrified him, and Jean listened without a single biting remark.

Armin’s scent lightened up considerably. They both slept in the nest and, compared to waking up rubbing off against a stranger’s coat, it wasn’t all that weird at all.

The morning dawned bright and clear, the snow stopping at least for the time being and Armin suggested they see about getting out of the cabin.

It was the best idea Jean had ever heard. Armin, it seemed, was finally done sulking and, once they’d managed to wedge open the door enough to get out and were able to see how deep the snow was around them, that meant he was ready to start working on his brilliant ‘get Eren into bed’ mission.

“We’re almost out of wood inside.” Jean said, glaring around at the stretches of shining white around them. “Need to dig out the pile and haul some in to dry.”

“I think...I want to try and share my heat with Eren.” Was Armin’s response.

Jean choked on his own spit then, grimacing, grabbed his shovel and started pushing his way to the back of the cabin.

He didn’t understand Armin’s insistence on including him in his disaster of a rebellion plan. Not that he thought Armin being sent off to the north to get knocked up for the sake of succession lines was okay, because he thought it was disgusting. As weird as he’d thought the engagement to Eren and Armin’s insistence on being hung up on it instead of embracing his freedom was the latest development was so much worse.

And sure, he’d told Armin to just go and sleep with Eren no less than a hundred times, not that he’d ever counted, but that had just been to see his friend get angry and flustered. Never once had he ever actually thought Armin was going to do it.

And to suggest spending his heat with Eren? That was jumping straight from nothing to ‘Everything shy of a mating bite’ in one big leap.

Armin had always put a lot of stock in the way things were supposed to be done and deciding to spend a heat with someone he wasn’t mated with while more or less engaged to someone else was about as far away from ‘proper’ as a person could get. Not that doing things the right way was really working out for him so far so there was that...

Still Jean wanted no part in Armin’s plans, knowing a bad idea when he heard it, but he knew he was going to end up deep in whatever nonsense Armin was planning in his quest for Eren’s knot whether he liked it or not.

Armin followed him, undeterred by the fact his little proclamation had nearly killed Jean, and started running down the list of things he needed to do to make what he wanted happen. He had, it turned out, been thinking things through while Jean had assumed he was doing nothing but pouting and tainting the air.

It was a stupid idea, it was going to go terribly, and Jean wanted to list all the reasons it was the dumbest thing he’d ever heard.

For one if anyone else found out it was going to be a big deal; both Armin and Eren would have to deal with the fallout. It wasn’t something their standing in the pack would be likely to bounce back from.

Then there was the fact that heats, the three times a year omegas were most likely to conceive, were...well, omegas were likely to conceive. It wasn’t just an irritatingly increased libido and being so horny you couldn't tell which way was up, it was the clawing burning desire to find someone to breed with, to be fucked full as often as possible in the pursuit of pups. Going through it alone was awful.

In the throes of a heat with a willing partner actually there, inside and putting out pheromones and scent cues, finally not dealing with the pain that came with trying to take care of it alone, taking the proper precautions could fall to the wayside.

Illegitimate pups would be a massive problem for the succession line and that was aside from the ‘supposed to be mating with someone else’ issue.

And if Armin actually thought he was going to spend days holed up with Eren and then be fine to just get sent off to be someone else’s mate a few weeks later he was crazy. Ignoring that Eren was, or had been, his best friend and the only person he’d considered mating with for reasons Jean couldn’t begin to understand, sharing a heat, having everything be reduced to sex, scent, and need, not to mention how being that close to someone felt, wasn’t just something you just got up from after.

You didn’t get to do that and then walk away like it had never happened.

It changed things.

All of which Jean could have said. Probably should have but the problem with Armin, in so far as he had any problems with the other, was that things were never just words and advice was never just advice. They were things Armin would take and turn around in his head, analyze and make connections with.

Even if the connections weren’t the right ones or shouldn’t be made.

So he just let Armin’s chatter wash over him and focused on digging out his wood pile. The snow was just above knee deep but the wind had seen fit to blow it up even higher against his cabin and it was high enough that there was no indication that the wood (or the ice box) were there at all.

It was going to be a pain but at least it would serve as a distraction. Between that and the bitter cold he might even resist the impulse to grab Armin and shake him until he regained some fucking sense.

And the blond was helping, shifting snow with his shovel, face going red from the effort as sweat dotted his brow, so that made it more or less worth dealing with him.

Jean was starting to think maybe he’d had less wood than he’d thought, or that he’d been wrong about where he was, when the wind blew and brought with it hint of something familiar. He stopped digging and made a motion for Armin to be quiet.

Not that he needed his ears to pick up scents; he just wanted a moment of silence before everything became that much more frustrating. Jean had a good nose, one of the best around though he had nothing on Mike, the Second Alpha, and even with the snow making everything smell washed out and strange he knew who was coming.

He dropped his shovel and backtracked around to the side, Armin at his heels, and almost sighed out loud at the sight of two figures heading towards his little cabin from the direction of the Yeager house. Eren, actually wearing a cloak and a scarf for a change of pace, and Marco, hands deep in the pockets of a coat similar to the one sitting on Jean’s floor.

Armin squeaked.

Jean wondered what kind of person he must have been in a past life to endure this kind of torment. A terrible one, clearly.

It turned out Eren and Marco were headed to check up on Connie, something that was long overdue for reasons Eren was all that clear on.

“Sasha and Mikasa won’t let anyone near the cabin.” Armin said, smiling wryly. “No one told you Sasha shot Franz?”

If Eren had been in his wolf skin his ears would have pricked up with how interested that little tidbit of information made him. “Oh yeah?”

“It was just a graze,” Armin continued.

“Oh. Too bad.” Eren’s eye cut over to Jean, who smiled thinly, before turning back to Armin. “I wanted to ask if you two wanted to come with. I’m guessing you haven’t been by in a while?”

Armin looked faintly embarrassed. Jean shrugged, not at all above admitting he’d been keeping his distance since Christmas. Mikasa and Sasha were terrifying and anyone who claimed otherwise was an idiot.

Eren’s expression shifted, becoming less amused and more something soft. “I meant it when I said I wanted to be able to spend some time together. The snow kind of messed that up but dad’s coming by too, when he’s done up at the greenhouse, for dinner so maybe if you wanted to stay for that?”

Armin nodded vigorously. “Yeah, okay. That...sounds fun.”

Eren smiled brightly then added, looking vaguely guilt: “You too Jean.”

Jean decided not to take it personally since, if he was being honest with himself, being stuck watching Armin make eyes at Eren while Eren pretended to not stare at Armin and everyone else probably talked babies didn't particularly interest him.

In fact it sounded terrible.

And a little time to himself wouldn’t be so bad. He wasn’t used to having someone so close to him with no reprieve like Armin had been the past few days. He hadn’t hated it or anything like that but...a break was needed.

Jean forced what he hoped was a realistic enough smile. “I’ve got to get this wood dug out and inside so it can dry and dig out the icebox and break up the ice in my water barrel. Maybe I’ll come by for dinner if I’m done in time?”

“Oh.” Armin’s face fell. “Right. I should stay and help.”

Jean swore silently then started shaking his head. “No, that’s fine. I can-”

“I can help.” Jean jumped at the sound of Marco’s voice; he’d managed to forget the other alpha was there at all. He hadn’t spoken a single word the entire time, content to just hang back by a few feet and leave them to talk.

But now he was closer, close enough that Jean was breathing in that scent and feeling a little stupid in the face of it. He couldn’t even think of something to say, his motivation to say he didn’t need help drying up. Marco smiled at him, a completely innocent curve of his lips, and Jean’s heart skipped a beat.

Well.

Fuck.

He was ready to dismiss the idea of Marco helping him, needed to dismiss it because he could just tell that it was a terrible idea and he didn’t want to get any deeper into whatever it was about Marco’s scent that appealed to him so much, when he caught Armin looking openly hopeful out of the corner of his eye. He twitched, mind flashing back to the cloud of sadness that had clung to Armin for days and the almost spicy scent of eagerness he was giving off now. Eren just looked thoughtful, head cocked to the side as he no doubt considered where leaving Marco to help him fell within the rules (Though considering he’d already foisted Marco off on his once Jean didn’t know what needed thought over.)

Knowing full well he was probably asking for trouble, he nodded. “Yeah sure.”

Armin’s smile was brighter than the sun hitting the snow.

Jean, for all his bluster, had always been a pushover for his friends.

He needed different friends.

\---

Marco was, unsurprisingly, more help than Armin had been and less annoying. They got everything dug out and cleared off in less time than Jean thought it would take and it only took two trips to get the wood up front when they were done. They talked about the pack and the lands, Jean carrying most of the conversation and Marco asking questions every so often. There were a few offhand comments about Marco’s family and pack but Jean couldn’t help but notice that the alpha looked a little sad each time.

Jean supposed he’d be able to relate to that before long.

It was surprisingly easy to talk to Marco and not nearly as strange as he thought it was going to be considering. But then again it wasn’t like Marco knew that Jean had defiled his coat so there wasn’t actually any reason for things to be weird.

There had moment when he’d strayed a little close to the alpha and realized that all the digging and shifting had caused Marco to break into a sweat, making his scent that much stronger, where his breath had caught in his throat. He was positive it had gone unnoticed though and was willing to call it the most normal conversation he’d had in days.

Probably since his initial conversation with Marco actually.

Talking to someone other than Armin about something other than Eren was nice.

Marco hovered outside of the door, arms full of wood, as Jean dropped his second load near the first ones. The first time he’s just taken the wood Marco carried from his hands, leaving Marco free to head back around, but this  He glanced back at the alpha, took in the red finger tips and nose and the way his breath was coming out in icy puffs then sighed.

“Come in, shut the door. You’re letting the heat out standing with the door open.”

Marco made a show of looking shocked but didn’t hesitate to do just that. “Is this allowed?”

“No.” Jean said blandly as he toed off his shoes. He wasn’t worried, the only people who might have been around to see Marco step inside were his parents and they already thought he was a lost cause so even if they thought he was sneaking in some alpha to fuck he wasn’t sure they would care.

Well, no, his father would care but only because of how it would ‘look’ if other people came to the same conclusion. His mother would just be worried and disappointed, her default ‘dealing with Jean’ state. He knew she just wanted him to be happy and genuinely thought a family of his own was the key to that. She worried about it and...it was frustrating.

It would have been easier if she didn’t mean well.

“Coffee or tea?” He asked as he took the kettle down from it’s shelf, banishing thoughts about his mother to deal with some other time. He sincerely doubted either of them were watching him so it wasn’t something he was going to worry about.

“Hmm? Either is fine.”

Jean glanced back over his shoulder to see what the other man could be doing that had him sounding so distracted. Had he left his sketchbook out? He didn’t know that he had a good excuse for spending so much time drawing Marco’s face. ‘I think your scars are interesting’ was probably not going something Marco appreciated.

Jean stopped breathing when he realized Marco had spotted the coat, balled up in the corner where he’d tossed it until he was prepared to deal with his shame, and was headed towards it. Jean flashed back to the morning he’d woken up wrapped around the stupid thing, and felt heat rushing up his cheeks.

If Marco had even a little bit of experience with omegas, or, hell, any experience with sex at all and why wouldn’t he since he was funny and seemed nice and even with the scars he wasn’t unattractive at all and oh Jean was so busted. He’d put it out of his head, focused on Armin, but he knew there was no way it wasn’t dripping with his scent even two days later.

“Wait, no, I still need to wash it and wait!” He practically tossed the kettle aside in his haste to stop Marco from getting any closer or touching it but it was a lost cause. Marco’s plucked it off of the ground and Jean came to a stop, eyes wide.

Marco tilted his head to the side, nose twitching. He looked confused for a moment before he, as  Jean’s heart sank, brought the coat up closer to his face and breathed in. There was a flicker of something in his eye then he was looking at Jean with an expression he couldn’t quite read. There was a pause, a long horrible judgement filled pause from Jean’s perspective, and he found himself fidgeting anxiously.

“Smells like you enjoyed it.” A raised eyebrow punctuated Marco’s words.  

It probably smelled more like pre-cum, slick, and the sort of confused shame that could only come from realizing you had nearly gotten off on a stranger's coat than ‘enjoyment’ but far be it for Jean to nitpick.

He groaned. “I am so sorry.”

“It’s fine.” Marco said but Jean was too busy dying on the inside to really hear it.

“It’s just Armin’s been here and I was using it as a blanket and it just-”  He trailed off, unable to think of what to say. “I’ll clean it tonight.”

Or maybe they could burn it and forget this moment ever occurred. He was sure he had something he could offer in exchange for destroying the coat. He took a step forward, bringing him almost close enough to snatch the thing and...well he didn’t have a plan for it yet but he was pretty sure he’d feel better if the thing he’d humped and transferred his scent and maybe fluids to was in his hand and not Marco’s

It wouldn’t make things any different but he’d feel less like a kid caught doing something ‘naughty’.

“I’ll take care of it.” Marco said, voice too serious for the way his lips were twitching with barely suppressed laughter.

Jean frowned then turned away, letting out an annoyed huff; Marco was teasing him and it was only his mortification keeping him from getting pissed off. That and he probably had a little teasing coming after humping and scent marking the guy’s coat.

“I’m kind of flattered actually.” Marco continued. Jean groaned again and put a hand over his eyes. Marco finally gave in to the amusement that had been written on his face and laughed; Jean’s ears burned with embarrassment.

This couldn’t possibly get any worse.

Fingers touched his wrist then curled around it and, reluctantly, Jean let his hand be pulled back down so he could look at Marco’s face. He was smiling, bright and easy, with a mischievous gleam in his uncovered eye that made Jean a little nervous. Not out of worry but, rather, realizing that the alpha had come so close that Jean could feel the heat coming from him and once again was breathing in Marco’s scent.

In the back of his brain there was a stir and a satisfied hum. He could feel that other part of him, wolf and omega, pushing in. Maybe Marco could feel it, or smell it, because he sighed softly and his eye went narrow and sharp, humor vanishing.

The air felt heavy suddenly, making the tiny cabin feel that much smaller, and he felt warm and flushed, a knot forming in his stomach. Jean’s throat was tight and even as he swallowed to try to get rid of the feeling he could tell something was about to happen.

“Don’t worry about the coat.” Marco said quietly. “Smells like you. Think I’ll keep it.”

That caused another pulse of satisfaction and a curl of want low in his belly.

Jean exhaled a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding then looked down, trying to think. He wasn’t Armin, wasn’t so naive as to be unable to identify interest when it was right in front of his face (Not that Marco was being anything resembling subtle; Jean got the feeling that the mating process in the south was vastly different), but this was...something he wasn’t used to. The physical closeness, the simmer of tension and heat between them, the twisting feeling inside of his chest.

He didn’t know Marco, aside from the little bit he’d learned that day and the fact he was pretty damn bold, at least by the standards of their pack. And that he smelled good.

Not that not knowing someone ever stopped people from ending up together; one need only look at all the people who had shown up to try and court Armin while knowing absolutely nothing about him. But this wasn’t some prelude to courting or something. This was just scent and want and gums itching like sharper teeth were about to break through. 

Something about Marco being so close, sharing the same air as him and staring at him so intently, was calling to parts of Jean that were usually buried unless the moon was full. It felt heart poundingly wild, like being in his fur, senses sharp enough to take in everything around him, and running through the the forest.

 _Touchtastebite_ thrummed just under his skin.

He swallowed again then looked back up to find Marco watching him intently. He breathed deep, letting the sugary sweetness roll over his tongue, then sighed.

It was good.

He wanted it.

Jean didn’t know which of them moved first but one minute he was searching Marco’s face for something and then next his fingers were curling around the coat, Marco’s now free hand was holding onto his hip, and chapped lips were pressing against his.

It wasn’t his first kiss, it was years too late for that, but it was the first that wasn’t a nervous and hesitant press of lips. This was impatient, demanding he open up as teeth bit down on his bottom lip, pulling and drawing it in to be tongued over and sucked on, and a tongue tasted his mouth in a slow filthy lick.

He could barely do anything except keep himself still and accept it. He was feeling lightheaded when Marco broke away with a wet pop. Jean sucked in a breath and then another, then leaned back into catch Marco’s mouth. He swallowed the alpha’s surprised laughter and then a deep moan when Jean wrapped an arm around his neck and brought their bodies together with a roll of his hips.

He let instinct, wolf and omega, take the lead. It was easy, no questions or doubt, just action. It had never steered him wrong before. Admittedly it had never insisted he make out with a stranger before.

Just once. Indulge, give in, get it out of his system, and then be done with it. Nip it in the bud early before it became a problem.

Marco pushed him backwards and he went without question, focus narrowed to the mouth against his own, the firm body pressed against him, and hands roaming his back. All too soon he had to breathe; Marco flashed him a grin then forced him to turn. He caught sight of his nest, furs shaken out and rearranged by Armin earlier that day, and then he was pushed forward.  

Jean hit the furs with a muffled ‘oomph’. He started to push himself up only to have Marco drop down on him, settling on the back of his thighs and then dropping forward so he was plastered against Jean’s back. His top layer was gone now so there were only their shirts between them and-

Oh, but he was hot. Alphas were naturally very warm in contrast to the often cold omegas but Marco was...hot, so much so that Jean gasped at the feeling of heat falling over him. Was he supposed to be that hot?

Would he be even warmer without any layers of clothing between them?

The answer, Jean suspected, was yes because a moment later Marco’s hand had found it’s way between him and the coat that was now pinned under him, and into his pants. His skin was rough and dry but all Jean could really feel was the blazing heat wrapping around him. Fingers flexed around his cock then moved; there wasn’t much room and it must have been an awkward angle for Marco’s hand and the dry contact came with an edge of discomfort but none of that stopped Jean from rising to full mast in Marco’s hand.

“Okay?” Marco’s breath was a warm puff against the back of his neck. Jean squirmed at the sensation, inhaling sharply when said movement had him pushing against the very obvious hardness in Marco’s pants. Marco grunted then rocked forward, forcing him to rut harder against the hand holding him.

Jean’s eyes fell shut. He wasn’t sure it was okay but he could breathe a little easier and the shifting under his skin had faded some. “‘s good.”

“K.” Marco’s thumb swept over the head of his cock, rubbing over the slit and dragging down, a little moisture easing the almost painful, but in a way that made Jean’s stomach clench, friction some. Jean mouth dropped open in a wordless noise as he let his head fall forward into the furs.

No more words were spoken for a time, Jean too busy gasping for air and straining to move underneath the larger body and Marco’s mouth occupied with licks and careful nips along his neck. Jean thought, distantly, that he should be concerned about marks being left behind but it was impossible to really grasp the thought let alone vocalize it.

It was easy, too easy, to just be wrapped up in Marco’s warmth and scent and have everything reduced to the hand on his dick, the short uneven strokes and the way patches of calloused skin caught on sensitive flesh. The way Marco’s dick felt grinding against him in slow circles. The light scrape of teeth on his skin and wet rasp of tongue flicking over his ear before Marco’s mouth drew it in, sucking.

It took an embarrassingly short amount of time for him to be straining in Marco’s grip, body tight and trembling. His toes were curled and his fingers were clenched tight around the coat, teetering on the edge. Marco’s tongue dragged over the shell of his ear and then he was murmuring to him, breath hot and accent thick.

“You gonna cum for me darlin’?” Jean whined low in his throat even as he buried his face deeper into the nest. Marco’s hand twisted on the upstroke and Jean came with an almost violent shudder as the tension in his body snapped.

Marco stroked him through it, milking his cock until he was shivering and spent, moaning brokenly into the fur under his face. There was an comforting lick over the back over his neck and then he was released, Marco’s hand snaking out of his pants.

He turned his head and cracked open his eye in time to see Marco drag a tongue over his hand. He slammed his eyes shut again. There was laughter over him, though a little more strained and breathless than it had been before. Marco shifted, rolling off of him and to the side.

“You okay?”

“Yeah.” His voice was a hoarse croak he barely recognized. “You didn’t-”

“I’m fine.” Another lick and a nose behind his ear, nuzzling against him. “I promise not to be offended if you pass out.”

Jean made a face but, after letting Marco drag his pants off and toss them to parts unknown, he did just that.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you think about all the scent stuff/scent marking it actually starts feeling gross and weird so. Don’t think about it too hard.  
> My [Tumblr](http://acharyadiako.tumblr.com/) Basically just rambling about my stories and other people's stories but if you like that kinda thing...


	6. You Watch The Days Go By

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armin's plan gets a little unforeseen help. Jean remains the best friend anyone could ask for in his own cranky way. Special guest appearances by Mikasa, Sasha, Connie, and a teeny flash of Marco's...teeth. Yes. Let's call it that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Opening up the world a wee bit. I'll probably introduce more people/widen the scope of things a little bit more each chapter. I have PLANS. *cackle*

 

Armin hadn’t really talked to Mikasa, Sasha, or Connie since around Christmas. Not for lack of caring, because they were three of his closest friends and he really did care, or even just because of MIkasa and Sasha’s overprotective ways, though that certainly played a role.

The aggression wasn’t unexpected but Armin still prefered to not be on the wrong end of two very capable and occasionally terrifying wolves who might not always be able turn down the urge to keep their mate hidden way. All wolves became a little more ‘animal’, for lack of a better word, when pups were involved and he heard it was a hard thing to control.

Carriers tended to build out their nests, turning rooms into soft dimly let dens by blocking out windows and dragging in bits of the outside world to build around. The pups were born in the dens and then stayed there for months, until they moved past the blind mewling stage at the very least, but often longer. Carriers withdrew almost completely from the rest of the world during that time, relying on their mate, or mates, to provide food and protection.

Sires could become hyper aggressive, jumping and snarling at even shadows they felt came too close to their pregnant mate, or mates. They prowled what they saw as their territory, scent marking everything to warn others off, hunted and gathered, helped with den building, and stayed on guard at all times.

It was, according to Hanji, carryover instincts. The Sina pack had been living like they did now for generations, a large connected pack that rarely had to deal with outside violence, so the primal fear of a rival pack or rogue alpha coming in and taking one’s territory, mate, and killing pups, didn’t have much merit. Yet the aggression and caution remained even if everyone knew it was illogical.

Instincts were hard to fight sometimes, particularly in regards to mates and children. Armin didn’t know anything about those impulses first hands but he did know that for most wolves there was nothing more important than their families.

Wolves could get pretty strange and animalistic when it came to family.

He was very aware of the traces of alpha and beta, blending together into something he knew was Mikasa and Sasha but was also somehow different and just a little threatening, all around as they got closer to the Ackerman cabin. If he had been an unmated alpha it would have set off warning bells in him and brought the fight or flight response to the forefront, but as an omega it just brought a sort of buzzing nervousness. There were potentially aggressive sires here, the wolf part of his brain murmured, and a wrong move could be trouble.

Mikasa was waiting for them in front of her cabin, looking tense, but a smile cracked the steely mask as they got closer. She had Eren wrapped into what looked like a bone crushing hug as soon as he was in range, laughter filling the air. He stood back, watching. He had been a little worried that, in spite of being invited, Mikasa wouldn’t be able to tolerate an unmated technically unrelated alpha but it looked like that wasn’t the case at all.

Far from it.

She was beaming and, once they’d broken the hug, Eren was smoothing a hand over her hair and straightening the tattered red scarf around her neck. Her hands rested on Eren’s shoulders for a moment, pale eyes taking him in quickly then she shoved him and laughed again, a deep throaty sound.  

“What took you so long? Sasha said you were going to be right behind her.”

Eren tipped his head in Armin’s direction as if that was all the explanation needed.

It must have been because a heartbeat later it was Armin being yanked closer and crushed in Mikasa’s strong grip. He gasped, air driven out of his body as he was lifted off of the ground. Close up she was the same as she ever was, lavender, grass, and warmth, and he hugged back as best he could with his arms pinned to his side like they were. He heard her breathing him in and then, somehow, she squeezed him even tighter.

“Mikasa you’re going to kill him.”

He was put down abruptly and Mikasa’s attention was back on Eren, a small teasing smile in place. “I should probably keep my hands to myself anyway, Connie thinks everything and everyone smells terrible lately. He refused to come out of his room last week until Sasha had thrown out her sandalwood soap.”

In contrast to her words she looped an arm around Armin’s neck and Eren’s waist and started guiding them towards the cabin. Armin told himself not to think much of it; Mikasa seemed cold to most people but he’d always known her to be full of a quiet sort of affection. She’d spent a lot of their time as kids wrangling them all and acting as self-appointed protector and, if he was being honest with himself, he’d missed that.

If he was being even more honest that was the main reason he’d been staying so far away. He’d told himself he was just giving them space to settle together and get ready for the pups but really Mikasa had taken Connie and Sasha as her mates there had been a distance between them. It was understandable, the shift in priorities, the honeymoon phase, and then Connie’s pregnancy had made her life revolve around her mates and of course some of that easy touching and affection would be lost.

But this, being so close to both Mikasa and Eren, felt like nothing had ever changed at all.

“Con’s sense of smell should be getting stronger at this point so that’s pretty normal. How is he doing?”

Fingers brushed Armin’s shoulder but retreated quickly. He turned his head, saw Eren’s arm around Mikasa’s shoulders and fingers dangling almost close enough to touch him again.

Armin turned his attention back to the ground, willing himself not to think anything of that either.

Maybe not totally unchanged.

“We’re taking care of him.” There was an almost defensive bite to her words “I spent almost as much time helping Grisha as you did and I don’t need someone else checking up on my mate.”

“He just wants to help.” Eren shrugged. “I think he’s nervous. First grandkid and he’s been gone most of the time, you know?”

That got a soft huff of laughter from Mikasa and then, glancing over at Armin, a coy smile. “Maybe you should hurry up and have some of your own to distract him from mine.”

Armin inhaled sharply. Eren made a choking noise and when Armin chanced a look over it was to find the alpha had gone bright red all the way up to the tips of his ears. Mikasa twisted away from them, laughing again, to push open the door of her cabin and step inside. Armin pulled his gaze away from Eren and scrambled after her.

A week ago he would have been embarrassed by the clear implication in her words and the way she’d looked at him but now...now he just felt hollow. Maybe Eren would have pups one day, soon even, but it wouldn’t be with him. That door was rapidly closing and no amount of good natured teasing was going to stop it.

But he didn’t want to think about that until he had no choice but to do so. Soon, since the snow would probably be melting before long and his grandfather would be sending a messenger to accept the offer, but not yet.

For now he wanted to focus on his upcoming heat, Eren, and spending time with his friends before he was unable to do so.

Mikasa beelined straight for Sasha once her shoes were off. The other woman was at the table dealing with a half stripped and cleaned deer but she stopped long enough to tip her head back to accept a kiss from Mikasa (Eren gagged loudly) then beamed over at Armin.

“Armin!” Connie shouted, waving frantically as if somehow Armin could miss him from a few yards away. He was sitting on a couch in front of the fireplace, a large pile of clothes in front of him and a quilt tossed over him. Armin went over; Connie let out a very put upon sigh as he moved his legs for him to sit down next to him but his smile was huge.

Armin looked at the pile in front of him, realizing quickly it was made entirely of tiny baby sized things. He blinked. “That’s a lot of stuff.”

“Hand me downs from me and Sasha’s family. They’re convinced we’ll need all of it.” He nudged them with his foot. “You’d think I was having a dozen pups with everything they’d sent.”

“Well.” Armin drew the word out, eyebrow going up pointedly. Connie looked almost the same as he had last time Armin had seen him; short, shaved head, bright eyes, but maybe a little more tired than he’d ever been before.

And he looked like he’d swallowed something very large and round and it had settled in his stomach. Very large. Armin imagined standing up had to be hell.

Connie didn’t look amused. “Are you calling me fat?”

“I’m just suggesting that there might be more in there than you think.”

Omegas did have a tendency towards multiples and while the first pregnancy was usually a singleton there were exceptions.

“That’s what ‘Kasa keeps saying.” Connie looked absolutely drained for a moment. “Sasha gets to have the next ones.”

A sharp bark of laughter came from the front of the room; Armin couldn’t help but laugh at the annoyed glare Connie shot in Sasha’s direction or the cheeky grin she sent back. The other omega looked at him, eyes narrowed.

“Laugh now Armin. One day this might be you.”

The statement was punctuated with a meaningful look towards where Eren was leaning against the table and talking to his sister. It took a serious effort to not let his smile fall as a tightness settling over his chest. It was like someone had thrust a hand into his chest and grabbed his heart in a vice like grip; it was hard to breathe around the feeling.

“Hey,” The mock anger on Connie’s face turned to concern. “What’s wrong? I was only-”

“I’m fine.” His fingers found a loose thread in Connie’s quilt to tug at. He wasn’t ready to tell anyone outside of Jean what was happening yet. He could trust Jean to keep it quiet but Connie would tell his mates and Mikasa would tell Eren and that would mess everything up.

“So. Where’s Jean?”  

Armin let out a breath, happy for the change in topic, then nudged the other man playfully. “Tired of me already?”

Connie rolled his eyes. “Glad to see you too, just thought Jean might come.”

They’d been a big group, pushed together because they’d been born so close to each other, but there had been a tendency to gravitate into smaller groups on occasion. Jean had been closer to Sasha and Connie, Franz and Mina were best friends, and Armin, of course, had been closer to Eren and then Mikasa as well when she’d come to live with the Yeagers. When they’d gotten older it was the four of them, Sasha, Connie, Jean, and himself, who’d stuck together. Mikasa and Eren had been gone, Franz had found a mate in Hannah, a beta wolf from a neighboring pack, and Mina had moved away years ago to marry an alpha female in the north.

And then it had been just him and Jean.

At first glance it probably looked more like a friendship borne of a lack of options but that was a disservice to the years that had come before that. They hadn’t been best friends or nearly as close as they were now but Jean had always been the person he had the easiest time really relating to.

“He’s got some stuff to do around his cabin but I think he said he might come up after.” Eren leaned over the back of the couch as he spoke; Armin just managed to not jump in surprise. He hadn’t even heard Eren walking over. A look over his shoulder found that Mikasa had vanished and Sasha had returned to breaking down the deer. “Marco is helping him so I don’t think it’ll take long.”

“Marco?” Sasha asked, laughter in her voice. “That’s the alpha who was at your cabin right? You left him with Jean? Why not just kill him outright, it’s less cruel.”

“I think it’ll be okay. Marco’s good with angry people.” Eren looked down at Armin as he spoke, something thoughtful in his eyes. “That’s probably why we get along so well.”

Armin wasn’t so sure that how well Eren got along with Marco would mean much in terms of how things would go with Jean but then Eren was working without some key information. Like the fact that Jean had practically had sex with Marco’s coat in his sleep.

He was pretty sure that ‘incident’ meant the odds of Jean getting angry and telling Marco to ‘fuck off’ were that much higher than they’d been before.

He felt sort of bad about leaving Jean behind but he’d gotten the feeling that the other omega hadn’t really wanted to come along. It wasn’t always easy to know which ‘kill me now’ looks were genuine and which one were just for show but he was almost positive Jean had wanted to be left alone for a little while.

Armin had been invading his space for the past few days, and he planned to make it up to Jean as soon as he could, but he wasn’t ready to go home and confront his grandfather yet. He didn’t know what he’d be able to do it without getting angry and yelling; he didn’t want to do any of that. He knew his grandfather meant well, in his own way, but that didn’t do anything to quell the sick feeling that rose up in the back of his throat whenever he thought about what was going to happen.

He owed Jean a lot for letting him hang around to feel sorry for himself and for holding his tongue about how stupid he thought Armin’s plan to sleep with Eren was. He’d seen it written all over Jean’s face, exasperation and frustration, but other than a few half-hearted insults he’d kept quiet and let Armin talk. Things like that didn’t come naturally to Jean and he appreciated it.

He needed Jean on his side. Needed it more than he needed a chance to be with Eren maybe.

“Here it is.” Mikasa said as she walked back into the main room. She was holding a small wooden box, roughly as long as her forearm, under her arm. “Almost completely full.”  

“Thanks.” Eren said as he pushed away from the couch. He shot one last look at Armin and then went to take the box from his sister.

“Heat tea.” Connie said, catching Armin’s curious look. “I guess it can be harmful in the last few months and it’s not like I need it so they’re taking it to redistribute.”

“You sure that’s a good idea?” Armin teased even as his thoughts started working on a plan. “Doesn’t look like it worked for you.”

Heat tea had two uses; the less common one was inducing heats in omegas and ruts in alphas, though why anyone would want to do something like that was beyond Armin. Being in heat was awful, at least when spent alone.

The second useage was to prevent conception in omegas while they were in heat.

Getting his hands on some would be...helpful. It would take care of one of the major obstacles to his plan (The biggest obstacle of course was what to say and do to get Eren to be willing but not ending up pregnant was almost as important) How exactly he planned to do that without being noticed however was another matter altogether. He wasn’t mated so it wasn’t as if anyone was just going to give it to him because he asked nicely.

Maybe he could ask Eren what was in it under the guise of educational interest.

Or just tell Eren what he wanted to do (and wouldn’t Jean appreciate him finally just ‘telling him’?) and go from there.

“You have to remember to drink it for it work.” Connie looked up at the ceiling as a blush stole over his face. “I was distracted.”

“Very distracted.” Sasha chimed in; when Armin looked she was smirking impishly and waggling her eyebrows. Mikasa’s scarf had found it’s way over her mouth but her eyes were crinkling around the corner, giving away her amusement.

Armin opened his mouth, intending to add more to the teasing, but caught Eren’s wrinkled nose and knew it meant ‘Don’t want to hear anything about my parents/Mikasa’s sex life ever’. He wasn’t as good at reading his friend as he’d once been but that look was one that was unlikely to change.

“I bet.” He said finally.

Connie sighed.

\---

Hours went past before Armin even realized it. Grisha appeared right before dinner was done and, after a quick check up for Connie, they ate while Armin talked about everything that had happened with the pack lately. Afterward Sasha brought out a pie and everyone migrated to the sitting area and Armin found himself kicked out of his seat so Sasha and Mikasa could crowd on to the couch with a bemused looking Connie. Eren let him have the only other free seat, seemingly content to sit on the floor at Armin’s feet and, eventually, leaned back against his legs like it was the most normal thing in the world.

He rubbed over the double wing charm around his neck so much it was amazing he didn’t wear a hole into it.

Grisha was telling them a story about a particularly unruly (“That means drunk.” Eren interjected) patient they’d had in Mitras and how Eren and Marco had ended up chasing that naked man through a human neighborhood.

Sasha was laughing so hard she was crying but all of the laughter faded abruptly. She inhaled sharply as her back went rigid and her head shot up; her gaze darted towards the bow resting in the corner of the room. Mikasa straightened up in her seat, turning away from Eren to glance towards the front door, then frowned thoughtfully. Connie stirred too but merely looked curious, head tilting to the side.

Someone must have been close to the cabin, but not nearly close enough for Armin to hear or smell them over the scent of food and everyone talking. Sasha, however, had an unusually strong sense of smell, and not just ‘for a beta’ but in general, Mikasa was probably very acutely aware of her territory these days, and a carrying wolf usually found their sense of smell got stronger the further along they were.

Grisha didn’t look up from the pie balanced on his knees “That should be Marco. I wanted him to come so you all could meet him since he’ll be here for the birthing season.”

Mikasa twitched but it was Sasha that spoke. “And? We have you and Eren, why do we need to meet someone else?”

“In case we’re busy without someone else? Or if something goes wrong and we need help?” Eren said and it was so careful, so reasonable, that it was almost like hearing someone else say the words. Not that Eren was incapable of things like that but he’d always been a little more instinctual and prefered action to explanations. “It’s hard to help if someone puts an arrow through your forehead.”

“Why would something go wrong?” Sasha asked, fingers twitching on the end of her ponytail. “Do you think something is going to go wrong? Is something wrong with Connie? You’d tell us if there was something wrong wouldn’t you?”

Eren groaned and Grisha blinked in a way that, somehow, spoke volumes. Connie snorted, drawing Armin’s attention back to him, then shook his head. “I told you they’ve both completely lost it. You’ll need someone else around to catch them when the stress finally dies them in.”

Mikasa glared at him flatly and Connie just grinned back, immune to his alpha’s look and, it seemed, both of his mate’s worry. Armin couldn’t begin to imagine how he dealt with what seemed to him to be a lot of smothering from Mikasa and Sasha but he supposed if someone could not just tolerate it but find it funny it would be Connie.

Sasha sniffed then dropped set was left of her piece of pie on Connie’s leg. “Shut up.” Connie mouthed ‘shut up’ back at her then laughed as another unamused look at leveled at him.

Mikasa’s lips pressed into a thin line and Armin could tell she was fighting with herself but then she breathed out, shoulders losing the tension they’d gained, and shook her head ruefully. “Not today or here. Not yet.”

“I understand.” Grisha brushed a hand over Mikasa’s then glanced at Eren. “Take the heat tea out to Marco and ask him to get started on checking the supply we already have.”

Eren pushed back from the table and Armin stole a glance over to the wooden box that had found it’s way next to door. He’d been trying to figure out how to at least get a look inside and see which herbs were in there but if Eren took it outside he’d miss what might be his only chance at figuring out what went into the heat tea without having to ask someone.

If he was going to be with Eren during his heat he needed to be sure he wouldn’t end up pregnant and that tea was the best way to go about it.

“I can take it out.” He said, jumping up so fast he’d nearly knocked Eren over in his haste. All eyes turned to him and he flushed, realizing he’d practically shouted at them. Even Connie’s smile had dimmed into something questioning.

He’d barely started putting his plan into action and already he was messing up.

He swallowed then made himself keep his voice level. “It’s just Marco right, not Jean too? I want to make sure nothing’s wrong.”

Eren looked like he was going to argue, Armin was very familiar with the stubborn look in his eyes, so he started moving towards the door before anything could be said, carefully avoiding everyone’s eyes.

“Be right back.”

And then he was outside, in the bitter cold, clutching the small wooden box to his chest and pulling the door shut behind him, pretending he couldn’t feel Eren staring after him. He breathed in then, shivering at the feeling of frigid air in his lungs after so long inside, started trudging towards where he assumed Marco would be standing on the edge of Mikasa’s territory.

It was dark but his eyes adjusted quickly. It wasn’t as good as it would have been in his fur but good enough. He could see Marco’s silhouette, turned in the direction of Jean’s house, and used the opportunity to flip open the box and fish out some of the sachets inside. He kept his gaze on Marco until he had the box shut and tucked against him again then looked down at what he was holding in his hand.

They were small paper squares sealed on 3 sides and folded over at the top. They didn’t have any smell he could detect, thankfully, and he was pretty sure now that they were in his hand he’d be able to hold on to them without anyone being the wiser.

He shoved them into his pocket then looked up again, steps slowing when he saw that Marco was no longer alone. Jean was standing next to him, peering up at the alpha and saying something. He was close enough to see Marco’s face now and, judging by the faintly bewildered look the scarred wolf was wearing, Jean was being his usual friendly self.

Jean was done with whatever he had to say by the time Armin was close but his expression was decidedly sour.

Maybe leaving them alone had been a bad idea.

“Everything okay?” Armin’s question was met with silence from Jean and a shrug from Marco. He tried to catch Jean’s eye but his friend was frowning down at the ground like it had personally offended him. No answers were likely to be coming from there. “Um. Here’s Connie’s heat tea. Grisha wants you to check on the rest of the supply since Mikasa doesn’t really-”

“Want a weird alpha around?” Marco nodded as he held out a hand for the box. “I figured that was how it was going to go.”

The box changed hands and, almost as soon as Armin fingers left the glossy surface, Jean was moving towards the cabin, clearly wanting to be rid of Marco. Armin turned to follow, and maybe to ask what had happened in the few hours since he’d left Jean’s cabin, when Marco called out to him.

“Yes?” Armin asked, watching as Jean went rigid out of the corner of his eye.

“Heat tea doesn’t smell like anything to omegas and betas but it smells like cherries to alphas.” Marco’s lips lifted up in one corner. “Thought you might want to know before you went back inside.”

Armin’s eyes widened and then he shook his head. “I don’t...I don’t know what you’re talking about? I didn’t...I mean I was holding the box. So.”

Marco looked unconvinced, not that Armin would have believed himself either. Jean’s head was in his hands and he was making an exasperated noise. Then, with a withering look in Marco’s direction, he held out his hand to Armin and lied.

“They’re for me, not him.”

Armin’s mouth dropped open but he couldn’t manage to make a single sound. He could think of at least six reason why that didn’t make any sense but, mostly, he didn’t know why Jean would say something like that.

“Oh?” Marco looked, for a second, disappointed and then there was a strange glint to his eyes and a curve of his lips that showed a hint of teeth “And who’s the lucky person that gets to spend your heat with you?”

Jean bared his teeth right back. The tension between the two was thick and Armin got the feeling he was intruding on something. He only just resisted the urge to take a step back.

“Fuck you.” Marco chuckled and Jean managed to look even more annoyed. “Armin just..give it here. Thanks for doing this for me.”

Armin considered, just for a moment, doing just that. Jean seemed willing to take responsibility for the tea, for whatever reason -to keep Marco from telling anyone maybe? From telling Eren? Would he tell? Armin couldn’t begin to guess- and if it got out it wasn’t as if it would do much harm to Jean’s reputation. For Armin on the other hand a lot of problems would follow.

He looked at Jean, hand still out, then back at an expectant looking Marco and back to Jean again. Unbidden the memory of Jean’s ‘dream incident’ came back along with the image of Marco’s flash of disappointment and then he saw the way his friend refused to look at the alpha with new eyes.

Was Jean interested in Marco? ...well, obviously he was ‘interested’ in a very loud and obvious way that Armin would never be able to cleanse from his brain. The question was ‘Was Marco interested’ and would he stay interested if he thought Jean was spending his heats with someone else?

“It’s for me.”

Jean’s arm dropped to his side. Marco nodded then gestured for the box. “I can take what you have for now then bring it by Jean’s cabin tomorrow. Maybe give you a rundown on what to do.”

“O-oh.” Armin blinked. “Okay?”

That was it? He was going to help? He wanted to ask why but he’d already been outside long enough that the others had to be getting curious and Jean looked five seconds away from exploding or storming off.

He fished out the paper squares and handed them over. Marco dropped them back in the box then, with a wave, turned and headed back into the tree line.

“...He does seem nice.”

Jean growled. He stooped down and grabbed a fistfull of snow; Armin winced, fully expecting said snow to end up in his face then blinked dumbly as it was slammed into his hand.

“Try to clean the smell from your hands.”

“Thanks?” He looked down at the snow in his hand; it was cold enough that it was already making his skin sting or maybe that was from the force Jean had used to give it to him. “For trying to cover for me too. And letting me stay with you.”

The silence that followed was tinged with surprise. Then Jean turned away and started trudging towards the cabin. “Whatever. Let’s go.”

When they stepped inside Jean's flatly stated "Wow Con, you're fucking huge." seemed to distract just about everyone from Armin and, as long as he ignored the feeling of Eren trying to stare holes through him, he could pretend it was everyone well enough. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Chapter: Marco gives advice . Jean is not okay with it but, per usual, Armin isn't listening to him. Full moons are full.
> 
> Oh! Also if you missed my 'Marco is a crazy alpha with control issues and Jean is a very confused subby omega' smut piece that little clicky thing down there that takes you to the 'A Pretty Rare Happiness' series page? Should help with that.


	7. Guns Hidden Under Our Petticoats

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jean just doesn’t make any sense to himself when Marco is close and a lot of weird wolfy powerplay shit happens. AKA: Jean’s wolf brain is out of fucking control and Marco seems to like it?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes: A little late with this but...stuff and things. This chapter might seem odd? The first part is during chapter six leading up to Armin talking to them outside. The second part is the next day. Idk, first part would have worked better on the end of five but this is how it wrote itself. I tried so hard to make this flow but we kind of need Jean’s weird wolf thoughts so...well.
> 
> MEH

 

 

Jean woke up in his cabin, drowning in the mixed scent of himself and Marco, and at first he felt good. He buried his face deeper into the furs, breathing deeply and stretching, a warm light feeling settling over him. He was very aware that what had happened shouldn’t have, that he was courting trouble by having a tumble with someone he didn’t know and that he was going to have to do something about it in a moment, but that didn’t change that it felt good. 

For about thirty seconds then his higher brain let the parts that processed by scent and sound poke in to have their say and it occurred to him that he was very much alone. He remembered having Marco pressed up against him, rough fingertips drifting over his back and a low rumble in his ears. He’d known it was letting things go too far, that he was getting too close, letting Marco’s scent get into his nose and mouth and head, but he’d continued letting the parts of himself that wanted that sort of thing have their way in spite of that. 

He’d soaked up the attention like a person in the desert would water, responded to the alpha crooning without any sarcastic comments, and been lulled to sleep while Marco held him. 

He was still warm since he was bundled up under blankets and the fire was still going, but not as warm. Marco’s scent was there but it was an echo of what it had been when they were next to each other. 

A quick look around found that there hadn’t been anything to indicate how long Marco had stayed after he’d fallen asleep, if he stayed at all, and nothing to suggest he might be coming back. Just gone.

He bit his lip against the whine that wanted to escape his throat. No one would have heard it but him and yet that was still something he wasn’t about to allow. He sat up, furs pooling around him, and rubbed the sleep from his eyes. 

This was fine. 

This was a very good thing. Hadn’t he just been prepared to explain to Marco that this wasn’t something that was going to have a repeat performance and that he wasn’t interested in courting or anything like that and...now there hadn’t been any need for that at all. Which was good. 

Marco being gone probably meant they were on the same page. He wasn’t sure why he’d assumed otherwise. They’d kissed some and then he’d ended up on his stomach with Marco’s hand down his pants (he still wasn’t exactly sure how they’d gone so quickly from point A to point handjob but in the moment it had seemed like a great idea.) but it wasn’t like any sentiment beyond Marco liking the way he smelled was expressed. 

There wasn’t a problem. 

Except that he was upset and he felt like it was a problem. It bothered him not on a thinking level but on the irritating instinct driven level. In the same way he’d wanted to kiss Marco earlier, the way that was all wolf and had made him feel first strange in his skin and then had gone soft and pliant under Marco’s attention, he was angry now.  

He knew, knew it like he’d known how to shift even though it wasn’t something he’d ever been taught to do, that Marco leaving while he was asleep was wrong. He wasn’t sure why it was wrong but it was. 

He knew that feeling, or knowledge maybe, was all wolf and that as he sat there he was just getting more upset. The part of him that wasn’t so much thoughts as impressions and wants, the wolf parts, felt small and confused. It felt like he’d been rejected and no matter how he turned it over in his brain and tried to tell himself it was a good thing it didn’t feel good.

The delight and satisfaction of having someone interested, someone who’d smelled of want and arousal for him, and the warm contentment he’d felt when he’d first woken up soured fast.

There was a shudder under his skin, and even though he didn’t want it to be there, there was something in the back of his mind that wanted to know if he’d messed something up. 

That was the point where he pushed himself up and forced his mind to focus on the task of ridding his cabin of the smell of alpha. Maybe once it was gone the weird feelings would go with it. The sudden wave of emotion was strange and he didn’t want to dwell on it. 

He opened up the window to air out the cabin, wiped himself down with frigid water he couldn’t be bothered to heat up, and washed his pants along with the blankets and furs that, to his nose, seemed to be holding onto the scent of alpha and lust. It bothered him a little bit to have to do it because there was something not completely unappealing about the way Marco’s scent mixed with his own.

He didn’t hate it. He probably wouldn’t have minded, angry as he was, crawling back into his bed and staying there, breathing it in for a while longer. 

But he couldn’t let Armin come back to everything smelling like it did so it had to be done and he doubted rolling around in alpha smell would have helped things anyway. 

Cleaning up didn’t wipe out what had happened and, unfortunately, it didn’t soothe what he knew was stupid and hypocritical huffy omegan bullshit either. 

He wondered idly if alphas and betas ever found themselves at odds with all the ‘parts’ like he did sometimes. Did they have senses and instincts that, at times, told them to do things contrary to the way they were supposed to do them? Did it ever get so ‘loud’ that being a reasonable person seemed like more trouble than it was worth? 

It wasn’t something that happened a lot, he wasn’t some bitten human who’d suddenly had a wolf shoved into them or a feral thing who was barely a thinking person anymore, but there were moments when he couldn’t quite keep the needy wanting parts of himself completely under control. 

He was sure most omegas felt that way sometimes or, at least, he refused to believe he was the only one who locked themselves up during their heat and hated every second of it because their bodies were screaming for them to find someone to make the experience less terrible. It was only the fact that being mounted by the first alpha or beta who smelled pleasing or was strong enough to hold an omega down would have unfortunate consequences that kept them inside. 

Except that he had sort of done just that with Marco. Not that he’d gone out and fucked the guy in some kind of heat haze but he’d let a similar desire take precedence and now he was having the same kind of ‘fighting with himself’ experience and

Maybe it was a heat thing. The spring mating season was close and was going to overlap with the moon, for him at least, this year. That was an awful lot of things trying to pull wolf instinct to the surface at once.

He was jarred from his thoughts by a rapping at his window. He looked up not nearly as surprised as he should have been to see Marco leaning in through the open window. He hadn’t smelled him coming but then his nose was full of Marco so how would he have noticed? 

“Hey there darlin’.” Marco smiled at him teasingly. “Woke up from your nap I see.” 

_ “You gonna cum for me darlin’?” _

Jean felt his face growing hot at the memory and looked down, hoping the fact it was growing dark outside would hide the blush. Other parts of him reacted, anger mixing with arousal that flared up at the sight of Marco and pleased feeling that came with the return of the alpha, the offended prickle at being abandoned fading away like it had never been there at all. 

He felt strange, uncomfortable in his skin like it was suddenly too small for his body.

He needed to get a handle on himself; there was no way one alpha should be able to derail him so much, oncoming heat or not. No one should be able to get under his skin like this just because he smelled nice. 

It was, some traitorous part of his mind insisted, a little more than that. Marco had so easily brought the animal things in him to the surface, had reduced him to a panting drooling mess like a blushing pup who’d never been touched by someone else before. 

Even now he felt...something. Something that was making him uneasy. 

Marco seemed oblivious to his discomfort. “Walking over to the Ackerman cabin now. Thought you might want an escort if you were going.” 

It was on the tip of his tongue to say no. He didn’t need an escort, for starters, and he hadn’t really planned to go over. He’d probably missed dinner by now, Eren and Armin were probably in full eye-fucking mode, and he was way too fucked up to be doing anything except going back to sleep and avoiding the rest of the world. 

But it had been a while since he’d talked to Connie and he knew the other omega had to be going crazy being cooped up like he was. Not to mention he wouldn’t be enjoying Eren and Armin’s twisted little romance anymore than Jean would. 

And it would be nice to talk to someone normal, something that had been lacking in Jean’s life lately. 

“I’ll catch up in a minute.” 

Marco nodded then pushed away from the window. Once he was out of sight Jean shut and latched the window then got ready to go outside, trying to calm his heart, now beating much faster than it had been before. 

It was even more bitterly cold outside with the sun nearly down than it had been earlier and yet his hands were still sweating and his face still burned. 

He didn’t understand what his body was doing at all. 

Maybe he was sick. 

Catching up to Marco didn’t take long since the alpha was standing still amongst the trees, staring in the direction of the cabin Connie, Sasha, and Mikasa shared. He must have been waiting because the place smelled so heavily of Mikasa, a clear warning from an alpha that this was her territory and other alphas should be wary. 

He could see Armin shuffling towards Marco, something in his hands. He frowned slightly; why was Armin bringing something to Marco? 

He intended to continue past where Marco was standing, Mikasa’s warnings didn’t mean much to him and he was curious about what Armin was doing (he was probably up to something. He had that pinched shifty ‘I’m going to be in trouble’ look on his face’.), but a hand caught his wrist in a loose grip. 

He could have pulled away easily but instead he glared hotly at the alpha who merely smiled back and tugged him closer. Jean let himself be pulled until he was in Marco’s person space, close enough to smell the lingering scent of soap on him, and then his wrist was released. 

“Don’t look so upset. I thought maybe we were friends now.” 

Jean scoffed even as he ducked his head. “I don’t make a habit of getting handjobs from my friends.” 

“Ah.” Marco tsked sadly. “You need better friends then. Like me.”

“You left.” Jean snapped. Marco blinked, looking bewildered; Jean sighed internally. Why had he said that? 

“Didn’t know you wanted me to stay.” He cocked his head to the side, the picture of a curious puppy. “Would you stop looking like you want to punch me if I stay next time?” 

Jean gaped. Next time? There wasn’t going to be a next time. 

The wolf, more alert than ever, hissed with displeasure. They wanted this one. He smelled perfect, like an alpha should. Like a mate-

Jean stomped down that thought viciously, hissing out loud. What. The. Fuck.

Marco’s expression was a bemused one, as opposed to the perfectly justified ‘wow you’re crazy’ look Jean probably deserved, but he didn’t say anything else. Armin was close enough that he’d be able to hear them anyway so it was for the best. 

 

\---

Listening to Marco give Armin a rundown on the finer points of heat tea usage was not even remotely close to what Jean considered a good way to spend his morning and that was without factoring in the fact that he’d been woken up entirely too early, in his humble opinion, by the sound of Marco knocking on his window. 

They’re stayed at the Ackerman cabin late into the night and, when they’d finally made it back to his cabin, escorted by Eren and Eren’s father, they’d headed right for bed. He’d been tired but not so tired that he hadn’t remembered to guide Armin towards the hammock. The other wolf hadn’t argued much, all too happy to just be off his feet and somewhere he could sleep. 

Even with everything washed and aired out he hadn’t wanted Armin sleeping where he’d let Marco jerk him off (and let was maybe a little bit of an understatement because once it had been happening he’d been all too happy to thrust into the calloused hands and have his neck and ear mouthed over.) It would have been gross, for one, and for two he was worried that somehow Armin would find him out. 

But mostly: gross. 

Armin had let Marco climb in through the window while Jean yanked blankets over his head and tried to ignore them. Why they couldn’t use the door he had no idea; the only people who might potentially see where his parents and it wasn’t like he was going to be up to something improper with Armin around anyway. Technically it was still pretty improper but coming in through the window was so much worse.  

Still he had no intention of getting involved in their little scheme and had every intention of going back to sleep and pretending like Marco’s scent wasn’t making his brain buzz in a mix of frustrated anger, confusion, and arousal. His instincts and the animal part of his brain they fed into were wide awake and not happy at all with another omega in his space, associating with Marco.

It was an entirely new level of ridiculous. He didn’t care what Marco was doing, Armin was always in his fucking space, and Armin was so far from a threat to anything ever that it was laughable he stirred anything in Jean. 

He felt ganged up on. Body feeling heat effects and the pull of the moon bringing up the wolf who seemed completely smitten with Marco for no reason Jean could see (He wasn’t particularly big or strong looking, wasn’t some perfect alpha specimen so what was he so drawn to exactly?) and his senses utterly focused on Marco. With his eyes closed he was honed in on every step he took, every time he shifted and his clothes rustled, the way his scent was lingering on everything he touched. 

His felt like he could feel his wolf skin pushing just under his human skin, senses sharpening as things started to bleed together.  

He might had stayed where he was, seething, if Armin hadn’t nudged him and then bent down to wave some fresh coffee in his face. 

Being weak seemed to be a theme for the past 24 hours so Jean let himself be lured out.

And so he sat in his hammock, hands curled around a mug of coffee, telling himself over and over that he wasn’t going to be getting involved in Armin’s little scheme. He wasn’t. It was just too stupid for words and, while he wasn’t going to tell him not to do it he also wasn’t going to encourage it. 

Armin was on his own for this little clusterfuck.

...probably. 

He watched Marco reach into his coat then pull out a small leather pouch, secured with leather ties. Jean eyed it over the rim of his coffee cup and tried not to squirm or let how uncomfortable the sight made him show. The idea of something that could cause someone’s heat to just start up didn’t really sit right with him. 

He’d never seen the point in it; who would want to be weak and effectively out of their right minds for a week on purpose? Even if he’d had someone to share it with he couldn’t see himself wanting to suffer through his heat more than the 3 times a year he already had to. 

Armin’s teeth dug into his bottom lip, expression nervous and uncertain then he held him hand out. Marco cast a sidelong look at Jean, who just stared back blankly, and let the pouch fall into Armin’s palm. 

“Thanks.” The blonde said softly, color rising up in his face. “For bringing it here and, um, not saying anything to anyone?” 

Blue eyes darted up; Jean could read the question in them easily. Marco must have been able too as well because he smiled disarmingly. 

“Nothin’ to worry about. I know your people are sort of,” A head tilt and an amused glint in his eye made Marco look like he was laughing without laughing. “Traditional? But who you decide to sleep with isn’t my business.” 

“Why’re you doing this then?” Jean asked. Marco shot him another look; Jean mentally berated himself for speaking. Speaking wasn’t being uninvolved! He hadn’t even made it ten minutes before opening his mouth. 

Still he was curious. More than curious. Why was he doing all of this for Armin? Jean didn’t think it was some attempt to sleep with or impress the other omega, though maybe he was watching their interaction very carefully for any signs to the contrary, and they didn’t know each other. What was Marco’s game here?

Because there had to be a game.

Marco’s shoulder went up in a lazy shrug. “You’re Eren’s friends, right?” Armin was suddenly bright red and looking down at the tabletop like it held all the answers to all the questions in the world. “I owe him and helping his friends out seems like a good way to go about that.”

Jean’s brow furrowed. “Owe him for wh-”

“Jean.” Armin interrupted, eyes asking him for something.

He didn’t need to ask what Armin wanted from him, he knew what that tone of voice meant. ‘Jean, you’re doing that thing where you push for no reason and maybe you could stop it now, thanks’.

Armin was probably going to be a great parent one day what with his ability to cram a shitton of scolding into a person’s name.

He rolled his eyes then made a ‘go ahead’ motion. Fine, trust the actual literal stranger who was here in their pack and only had...well Eren and Grisha to back him, which was actually a pretty ringing endorsement.

Jean sipped his coffee. 

“Alright,” Marco’s fingers tapped the table and there was still laughter on his face. “Each sachet is one dose. It’s a fine powder that you’ll want to add to boiling water and mix very well. I hear it doesn’t really have a taste but most people throw tea leaves to cover what little taste there is. Don’t take it on an empty stomach unless you like feeling terrible.”

Jean snorted but when Armin and Marco looked his way he kept his mouth shut. He just thought it was a very alpha thing to say, as if being in heat wasn’t already terrible. He doubted whatever was in heat tea was going to make anyone feel worse unless it caused death on an empty stomach. 

“To kickstart your heat-” Marco started once it was clear Jean had nothing to say.

“I don’t need to do that.” Armin said quietly. 

Marco shrugged. “So you don’t accidentally do it then. You take three doses on the first day then two the next two days. Nothing on the fourth and your heat should start on the fifth.” 

Armin nodded. His face was still red and he had the pouch practically clutched to his chest as if he was afraid it was going to run away from him if he loosened his grip but he looked as serious as Jean had ever seen him. His eyebrows were knit together, his mouth was set into a thin line, and his back was ramrod straight. 

He looked...determined. 

He was really going to do it. The realization took Jean by surprise and he found himself staring at the blond who’d been his near constant companion the past few years. Armin, who’d always stayed inside the lines and got annoyed when anyone suggested he do otherwise, was really going to take this big leap.

He supposed he’d thought Armin would change his mind at some point before the inevitable disaster took place but it didn’t look like there was any doubt in him. 

Jean wasn’t sure if he was horrified or proud. 

“For your heat, to stop pregnancy from happening, you take one dose a day, try to aim for around the same time everyday. Whoever you’re with may need to help you out with that part.” There was something almost apologetic about how he said it and the way his shoulders went down some. 

Like he’d seen how out of their minds their nature could make some of them. Not that all omegas had the sort of hearts that turned their brains to mush and made them so weak and desperate something like remembering to drink some tea was beyond them. Probably not even most of them but enough that it was a concern worth noting. 

And heats got worse the longer you went unmated: nature’s way of reminding them that their breeding clocks were ticking. 

Jean didn’t know how bad Armin could get. He’d never asked and, close as they were, they’d never tried the ‘spending a heat with another omega in hopes the pheromones and proximity would ease it’ thing. Connie and Armin had, before Connie had mated, but Jean…

His heats were rough. Always had been. 

Were getting worse. 

He wasn’t really fit for company. 

“Missing a day might not hurt much but I wouldn’t recommend it. Miss more than one and you might as well not take it anymore so if you get bad,” Marco continued. “You’re going to want to ask for help, seriously.” 

Jean tightened his grip on his mug, amended his earlier thoughts about Marco having no idea how terrible heats could be, and wondered how many omegas Marco had helped out. He could easily imagine that where he was from, some less ‘traditional’ pack where omegas weren’t expected to just tough it out, he might have been popular. A perfect alpha specimen, no, but there was something there anyway. Something in the darkness of his eyes and the tilt of his neck, the set of his shoulders and the sound of his voice. 

He could easily imagine other people being interested and Marco certainly seemed like the type who’d have no problem accepting those kind of offers. Saving himself for his mate was clearly not something he was worried about.

His gums itched and when he pressed his tongue up he felt sharp edges. 

Marco was still talking to Armin with words that filtered into Jean’s ears as meaningless noise but he was looking at him, gaze intense and dark. Jean felt heat slither in his stomach, unbidden and unwanted but there anyway and tinged with an anger he didn’t recognize in himself. 

Everything in him demanded he drop his eyes,  _ submitsubmitalphasubmit _ , but he just took another drink of his coffee and stared back. 

Marco smiled then looked down. 

Jean let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. Sound returned to the world. 

“If you do start feeling bad, outside of what you’d expect from a normal heat, ginger or angelica root help and won’t mess with what’s in the tea.” Marco leaned back in his seat. “And that’s about it, unless you have questions.” 

“Not about the tea but if you don’t mind answering something else?” Armin’s voice dropped to just above a whisper and his cheeks were flaming again. His hands moved down to his lap, fingers tangled together over the pouch. 

Marco’s eyebrows went up in surprise. “No, go ahead.” 

Armin’s eyes darted over to Jean; he braced himself to be pissed off by whatever the other omega was about to say. 

“If an omega was interested in you how would you want them to let you know.” 

Marco was quick, managing to speak before Jean could throw his mug at Armin in a fit of frustration. “You mean other than just telling me?” Jean shot Armin a look of triumph. “I s’pose I’d like them to start a chase.” 

Triumph turned to disbelief. 

“What?” Jean was on his feet, mug slipping his fingers to fall to the floor with a slosh of hot liquid over his foot and ankle and shattered ceramic across the floor. He ignored it. 

Marco’s smiled, slow and lazy, but his eye was smoldering. “A chase. I’m sure you know how much we alphas like to hunt, yeah, so what could be better than chasing an omega?”  

Jean’s mind went blank and, this time, it was him who looked away. 

Armin, unfortunately, wasn’t so hindered. He looked thoughtful. “A chase. ...the moon is coming.”

“Armin, you can’t-” Jean stopped, shaking his head. “Do you want to get chased down like an animal and then what, hope you don’t get hu-” 

Armin’s eyes were hard as he cut Jean off. “Eren wouldn’t hurt me.” 

“Right.” Jean scoffed. “Because Eren is so in control of himself.”

Armin didn’t know fuck all about how Eren could be when provoked and a chase was sure as hell going to provoke him. And maybe Armin’s ignorance was partially Jean’s fault because he did know what kind of wolf Eren could be, had seen it up close and in ugly detail, and had never said anything but it wasn’t…

It just wasn’t the sort of thing he’d ever felt the need to talk about. Mistakes had been made all around, especially on his part and, besides that, he knew nothing good could come of challenging Armin’s view of his best friend. 

“You don’t know Eren like I do.” Armin said and Jean laughed before he could stop himself. 

“You and Eren talk twice in as many years and you think you still know him?” He knew he was being stupid, saying the wrong thing, but the irritation he’d done such a good job of keeping more or less contained boiled over. He’d been listening to Armin moon over Eren all this time, mostly against his will, and he was tired of it. 

Had been for years not that Armin had ever asked. 

“Your stupid crush is one thing but you have no idea what a chase might do to him. When was the last time you shifted and ran with Eren? Before your parents died and he skipped out on you as soon as he wasn’t obligated to mate you anymore?”

And that was probably a step too far; he felt it once it was out and his anger just sort of shriveled up and died, leaving him feeling sick to his stomach. Armin’s face closed off as he pushed away from the table. 

Jean swallowed his pride and a not small amount of bitterness. “Look, Armin, there are things you don’t-”

“Thank you Marco.” Armin bit the words out through gritted teeth, not giving any indication he’d heard Jean at all. “For everything.” 

And then he was gone. Walked across the cabin and out without another word. Jean didn’t say anything or attempt to stop him, the scent of Armin’s anger so strong that he was recoiling from it. It burned his nose, a disgustingly sickly sweet smell, and it was as clear a warning as if Armin told him to stay away with words. 

Silence reigned after the door shut. Jean’s legs decided they didn’t want to keep him up anymore and he stumbled back into his hammock, pressing a hand to his eyes. 

Fuck.

Where had all of that even come from like that? 

He tried to remember the last time he and Armin had seriously fought and the only thing that came to mind was their big blow up at about the same thing everything else had been going to hell. They’d gotten past it, had to because Eren and Mikasa had been gone so Armin had needed him and he’d needed Armin, though he’d never said as much because that just wasn’t who he was.

Years without anything more than petty arguments smoothed over by the next day and he went and blew up for what? To protect Armin?

That had clearly gone well. 

He sensed Marco getting closer and groaned. “How about you leave too?” 

“Hey.” The alpha’s voice had dropped to something warm and soothing that made Jean shiver. Fingers brushed the back of his neck and for a brief moment he considered tipping his head and just allowing the touch. 

He jerked away, swiping at Marco’s hand, and glared. “Don’t fucking do that. Don’t try that alpha bullshit on me.” 

Marco’s face melted into something Jean couldn’t get a read on. “Someone really did a number on you didn’t they?” 

Jean blinked, too startled to snap back. “W-what?” 

“I wasn’t going to try any ‘alpha bullshit’, unless apologizing for starting a fight qualifies.” Marco’s hand settled on his shoulder. “If I was going to scruff you I would have just done it, not given you a warning.” 

Jean wasn’t entirely sure he believed that but he could also admit he had an aversion to being scruffed that might have made him a little paranoid. His father was fond of it; gripping the neck and pressing the scent glands was guaranteed to make an omega lock up and lose all of their aggression temporarily. Throw in a little parental or alpha cooing and it would almost always be enough to reduce them to simpering piles of mush. 

During his failed courtship his father had given his suitor permission to scruff him as needed in case he got mouthy. 

He hated it. Hated that he’d let it work. 

“Fine. Whatever.” 

“Who is it that has you so jumpy about all your omega ‘bullshit’ anyway?” Marco’s teeth were visible as he not quite smiled. "I could make them wish they hadn't if you wanted." 

Jean rolled his eyes. “Save the alpha posturing, Eren beat you to the punch years ago.” 

Jean still wasn’t always so sure the brutal part of Eren he’d seen that night had actually been on his behalf or if had just been Eren needing to let his wolf out. They’d never really talked about it. Sort of an unspoken mutual agreement to not talk about their fuck ups. 

Armin really had no idea what playing games with Eren in his fur under the moon might do. If he just ended up fucked out in the dirt he’d be lucky. 

Marco looked genuinely upset, like he’d actually been looking forward to...what? Beating someone up on Jean’s behalf over something that had happened what felt like a lifetime ago?  No, probably not really. Just the sort of shit alphas said to seem bigger and badder than they really were. 

“Too bad, I’m better in a fight than I look.” Marco’s thumb swiped over a bare patch of skin just above the neckline of his shirt. Jean tilted his head up to get a better look at the alpha; his eyes lingered over the eye patch and the raised scar tissue that vanished below it. “You wanna see?” 

His hand, the one not on Jean, went up towards his face. Jean reached up to catch it, pulled it back down while shaking his head. 

“You wanna know what happened?” He didn’t look bothered. He didn’t looked much of anything except resigned. “People usually ask right away.” 

Jean shook his head again. His tongue felt thick and his throat was tight, both unwilling to let him speak, and the world seemed to shift, everything strangely slow and heavy around him. Marco’s hand caught between his own was warm and he could feel all the rough patches and lines against his palm. He remembered what they'd felt like on his cock and rubbing over his back; two different sorts of warmth bloomed inside of him. 

He felt emptied out, even the stomach turning feeling that had been in his gut after he yelled at Armin gone, except for that warmth. 

When Marco kissed him it was with devastating carefulness and when his hand touched his neck, but didn’t grip or fit against his scent glands, he sighed into it.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter: What’s up with this ‘Chase’ anyway? Is it really that an bad idea? Is Eren as dangerous as Jean thinks? Is Armin still riding the bad idea train? Should Jean have let Marco tell him how he got all those scars? Did I really cram most of the plot related stuff into the last two pages? Do Marco and Jean end up rolling around on those furs he just cleaned?


	8. Find Me Where The Wild Things Are

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armin would probably be a lot better off if he was even slightly less stubborn or ever listened to anyone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: I am... genuinely unsure of what to call this so. Let's say 'Consent Issues'? ...on everyone’s part?

 

He and Jean didn’t talk in the lead up to the mating season. Armin wasn’t sure what to make of it; Jean had been his near constant companion for years. They fought from time to time of course, that was to be expected, but it had never been anything like this. Normally one of them would apologize or at least reach out in the spirit of letting go of whatever had set them off to begin with but Jean didn’t seem inclined to do that and Armin sure as hell wasn’t going to.

Not because he was angry; the white hot anger had given way to shock and confusion and then a cool numbness. It wasn’t that Jean was so opposed to the idea of Armin instigating a chase because he knew that came from a place of worry and, in most circumstances, there merit to that worry.

The problem with Jean’s words was that it wasn’t anything Armin hadn’t wondered about himself. The problem was that they had hit home hard and made him want to question everything about himself and what he was planning.

Jean had vocalized the things Armin worried about most: that he didn’t know Eren anymore, that Eren had run away the minute the engagement had been broken because he’d never wanted Armin to begin with, that he really had a ‘stupid crush’ and just couldn’t see it for what it was. Maybe he was hanging on to something that had never really existed.

After all if Eren wanted him he could have done something. He’d had years but he’d just gotten further away and maybe he was there now, trying to mend their friendship but it didn’t mean anything except that Eren still wanted to be friends.

It didn’t change the past few years.

Didn’t mean he wasn’t delusional.

It was one thing to have those thoughts himself, to have doubts, but to have someone say it to him like that was just too much. It stayed in his head and he couldn’t shake it no matter how hard he tried. He even spent time with Eren, helping him up in the greenhouses and with checkups on some of the pups, but Jean’s words lingered every time he looked at Eren.

He just couldn’t believe that Eren could ever hurt him. He knew that with a chase it was a possibility but...it was Eren.

They’d slept in the same crib, nipped each other’s ears and pulled tails and laughed at each other as they shed winter coats and became silly looking patchy messes. They’d stayed up late at night hunched over books, straining their eyes to read without lighting a candle and slept huddled together on the same furs even when it wasn’t exactly appropriate to do so.

When his parents died it was Eren who’d put aside his own problems to stay with him before his grandfather had come from up north, coaxed him to eat, stroked his hair and called him back from the dark places he’d fallen into, begged him to leave his bed and keep going when he’d almost completely shut down from the pain of it.

He didn’t know what Jean thought he knew about Eren but he couldn’t believe that Eren would do anything to knowingly hurt him.

But then it probably was ‘unknowingly’ that Jean was worried about in regards to a Chase. Slightly sanitized name aside a chase was really nothing more than alphas hunting an omega, running them down, sometimes competing with and fighting each other, with the one who finally got their hands on the omega taking possession.

It wasn’t the nicest of things, maybe even worse than mating fights when Armin really thought about it. Mating disputes at least implied that the omega or beta was interested in the people fighting over them but a chase was different. Always omegas, always under the moon when the pull from their primal sides was strongest, always when an omega was in heat, and any interested alpha could step up to hunt them down with no regard for the omega’s interest in them.

It was supposed to make alphas crazy, bring out their wolf and really show who was strong and worthy among them. Their higher brains could shut down completely and some people thought that was for the best, so morals and compassion couldn’t get in the way of a test of ability and strength.  

Once it was over the omega had no say in what happened next, be it being claimed, mounted, or harmed. No one else would step in; the alpha who had won was entitled to their prey and had proven themselves the strongest. Their nature demanded that when someone proved themselves dominate everyone else backed down.

It could be brutal, or so Armin had heard. No one in the Sina Pack had been chased since before he was born (courting was a much nicer process and it, generally speaking, put the power in the hands of the one being courted and everyone thought that much better than being able to hunt each other like animals and take without consequence) so he only had second hand accounts that were made to be horror stories to keep him in when he was in heat.

‘Don’t go outside or the alphas might Chase you.’

‘Be careful when you’re in heat or you might start a brawl between suitors.’

He saw where Jean’s concern would be but it wasn’t like he was going out to be chased down by every bachelor alpha for miles. Just Eren, only ever Eren, and he knew he could trust Eren to not lose it.

The only real worry was that Eren wouldn’t be interested but if that was the case then he’d know for sure. A chase was simple, honest, a moon drenched ritual as old as wolves themselves: either an alpha wanted an omega and would hunt or they didn’t and wouldn’t.

There wouldn’t be any doubt.

Once he’d resolved to do it he got to work. He was going to need to be in heat for starters and suddenly what he’d thought was excess on Marco’s part was a boon because he was going to need a lot more heat tea than anticipated.

Mating season was about 3 weeks long and Armin’s heat always  fell towards the end of the season but the moon was going to be at the start of it this time around. He needed things to line up which meant he needed to force his heat to start.

He used the packets like Marco had told him, drinking them down as he forced himself to eat more like he would if he was in pre-heat. His grandfather had given him increasingly strange looks; clearly confused by him acting like his heat was coming when there was no reason it should have and no pre-heat scent about him but he’d just shrugged and said he felt like his heat was oncoming.

He’d been skeptical about whether or not it would work right up until it did. The day of the moon he woke up feeling flushed with heat, wet between his thighs, and clutching his stomach against a wave of cramps.

His grandfather had fussed a little, concerned about the change in cycle, but Armin eventually convinced him that it was fine to pack a small bag and stay with Elder PIxis until Armin’s heat had passed like he always did.

He was happy to find that he felt about the same as he always did when he heat was about to start in earnest. Cranky, hungry, and frustrated, but still able to think clearly. His heats weren’t as bad as some people’s so the first day or two were usually ‘mild’, then he’d fall into the heat haze for 2 or 3 days, and the last bit would be spent sore and lonely but with his wits about him.

He’d worried he’d slide right into a haze like Jean did when he was in heat (He’d never seen Jean in heat, since the other omega cycled towards the beginning of the season and locked himself away, but Jean insisted he started out in the haze, slipped into being heat crazy and then cycled between the states until it broke.) but he felt fine.

Relatively speaking.

He was wiping himself down for what felt like the third time that day, he hated feeling sweaty and gross when he still had the presence of mind to care, and trying to figure out how he was going to let Eren know he was going to be out for the moon when there was a knock at his door.

He threw his shirt back on as he shuffled towards the door. He knew it was Eren before he opened it and had to bite the inside of his cheek to keep from smiling like an idiot.

This was better than he could have hoped for.

Eren’s eyes widened slightly when he opened the door. Armin watched his reaction closely, desperate for a sign that his scent was affecting the alpha. Maybe Eren would just...jump him then and there, right in the floor of the doorway or against the wall of the cabin, and all the other stuff could just be forgotten.

He squirmed at the thought.

Maybe he would jump Eren instead. Just push him down and climb on top and bring them together like Eren seemed afraid to do. Why couldn’t he? This was the alpha he wanted, right in front of him, and oh he needed him. There was a wet sloppy ache inside of him and he needed an alpha, this alpha, to fix it. Needed-

“Your grandfather came by and said he was worried because your heat had started so early and that can be painful so Marco thought one of us should be bring you something and I didn’t want to send him because- anyway here.” It came out in such a rush that Armin could barely process any of it before a small cloth satchel was being pushed into his hand. “Um. Do you need anything? Maybe I can get Connie to come by? Or Jean...not Jean. He’s probably clawing up the walls by now.”

Armin blinked dumbly. “What?” Why would he want Jean or Connie when Eren was right there, smelling so nice?

“In case things get bad?” Eren shifted anxiously. “Being around a pregnant omega is supposed to be-”

“I’m going out tonight.”

“You’re what?”

His tone was sharp, demanding and forceful, and his hand shot out to wrap tight around his forearm. Armin might have moaned, it was hard to be sure with his skin, made sensitive by his heat, tingling under Eren’s grip. Probably did because in the next moment Eren was skittering back, eyes wide.

He sighed, disappointed.

Eren collected himself quickly, stern expression coming back. “You can’t go out. It’s the moon and you’re in heat.”

Armin licked his lips and wondered what it would be like to kiss Eren. “That’s the point.”

“That’s the-w-what?” The alpha sputtered then stepped back into his space, shaking his head. “If you run with the pack every unmated alpha around will try to chase after you. Someone might end up claiming you or doing...something. To you.”

Eren blushed darkly; Armin’s fingers twitched at the thought of reaching out and feeling the heat under his skin. He clenched his hands into fists to keep them at his side and shrugged. “Maybe that's what I want. Maybe...maybe I’m tired of waiting for someone to...do something.”

He could read the understanding bloom on Eren’s face. Something tight and angry took over right after as green-blue eyes narrowed and the alpha’s mouth went flat. “No.”

It wasn’t a request, not at all, it was an order, propped up by an alpha growl. He seemed to grow, towering over Armin and making him shrink back as he moved back into his personal space. Hands pushed him against the doorframe and held him there as Eren’s eyes bored into him.

“Stay inside Armin.”

He wanted to tell Eren it wasn’t up to him, that he’d be doing what he wanted and if Eren didn’t like it he’d need to do something about it but his mouth was dry and his head started to pound. The hard edge of the doorframe dug between his shoulder blades but he didn’t try to get away, held in place by the alpha’s words as much as his hands. The throb of want in him was getting worse, responding to an alpha demanding obedience and taking control.

_Take me, mount me, bite me, pleasepleaepleaseanythingpleae_

Eren looked at him searchingly then, seemingly satisfied with what he found, moved away from him. Armin had to reach out and grab the other to keep himself from folding on shaking knees.

“I...I’m sorry about this.” Eren muttered and he did look contrite. “But I mean it. Do not go out. You don’t know what an alpha might do to get to you.”

There was no room for argument there, not that Armin thought he could. Every part of him wanted to fall to his knees and do what the alpha was telling him to do. He’d never felt so much like he needed to give in ever before or felt anyone’s words resonate in him like Eren’s were.

That was the end of the talk apparently. Eren pushed him back inside then, shooting him one last dark look, stepped out pulling the door shut after him.

Armin sat down on the floor heavily, trying to grasp what parts of his brain weren’t still reeling.

Eren had just commanded his submission like he was really his alpha, crowded him back and gave him an _order_ like he had not only had a right to do it but would be obeyed, like he was Armin’s mate.

Like there had been no doubt in his mind that Armin would all but drop for him. Which he had. While getting almost painfully hard in no time at all.

He bit his lip, trying to decide if touching himself while thinking about Eren telling him ‘No’ would be too strange.

\---

It took a few tries to get out the house. The first two tries he got the door open and then dropped to his knees, head hazy and pounding, like there was someone yanking him down there. The feeling only faded when the door was firmly shut.

Who had ever heard of an alpha command from someone who wasn’t a mate being so strong? It was like his body didn’t want to fight it at all.

The sun started to go down and the restlessness that came with a full moon started to set in. He wanted to run, heat or not, and the call of the moon was stronger than he could remember it being. He tried to clear everything else but the moon out when he tried going out again.

Once outside of the door, only a dull pulsing behind his eyes this time, he looked up at the sky. The moon was out and full and the sun was almost down below the horizon. He could feel the moon, singing to him and tugging at his bones, humming through him and rattling him from the inside out.

The change came easy and with barely a flicker of thought, like stretching out a muscle. It rippled through him, warm and comforting, turned him to liquid, stretched and shifted him around with a barely there itchy feeling, and then he was on all fours. The world was different, sharper even though the colors dimmed and became washed out, scents on the air filling in ‘images’ for things that weren’t in front of him.

He could smell an alpha wolf, Eren, in the air. He’d been in his fur, laid his scent down until it was like a dense cloud to act as a warning to anyone else who might come by.

 _This omega is protected, stay away_.  

Armin focused past that, ears pricked for any sounds that shouldn’t be there and tongue lolling out to taste the air. Eren’s scent made it harder to concentrate, left him feeling itchy and wet and his heat was stronger like this, so much stronger. Before it had just been starting, just a touch of warmth in his belly and the throb, but now it was like a fire and he felt that emptiness inside that he’d never been able to sate on his own.

A twig snapped somewhere in the trees. Something rustled, stopped, rustled again. He cocked his head towards it; he couldn’t know if there was someone out there let alone that it was Eren but something in hims screamed that it was.

The alpha was out there, watching him, waiting to see what he would do. Eren’s command to stay inside was still pressing down on him and there was a part that wanted to tuck his tail between his legs and obey, to not upset the alpha-his alpha in almost all ways- but the pull of the moon and the thrum of need inside of him kept him upright.

He could do this.

He knew if he went back inside Eren wouldn’t be following him, wouldn’t give him what he needed-to be taken and filled-and it would just be another heat spent alone and empty.

He was going to disobey. He was going to make the alpha chase him down and work for the submission he had demanded from him.

He headed for the trees, head up and eyes searching.

There was a growl to his left, a wordless command, and he thought he saw something moving far off in the dark.

_Go back inside. Do as I say._

Armin barked back then wheeled around. He took off, sprinting through

_Chase me. Make me. Or someone else will._

He was unsure for a long heart stopping moment where he could only hear the sound of his own paws slapping against the earth. But there it was there, the sound of someone heavier and faster coming after him.

Eren howled and a shiver zipped up his spine. The alpha wolf sounded _furious._

\---

The moon was overhead but behind heavy cloud cover, casting it’s weak eerie glow over everything. Things had finally started to thaw by day but now, back in the freezing night, the ice in the trees had formed into thick curtains that caused them to bow low towards the ground. The ice caught the light and made the world seem strange and twisted all around him, made it hard to tell where he was in woods that was normally as familiar as his own cabin to him.

The darkness felt like it had a physical presence around him, pressing tightly in the spots the moonlight couldn’t reach and trying to choke the air right out of him. His lungs were begging him to stop, to breathe, but the air so chilly and thin that it felt like swallowing glass every time he sucked more in.

Armin ran through the trees, winding around them and crashing through thick underbrush, long past the point of trying to be stealthy or ‘smart’ about what he was doing. His heart was beating so loud he could scarcely hear the alpha wolf following him but there was no doubt in his mind they were still there. He could feel it in his bones, smell them when the frigid wind blew just so.

He was nervous and terrified and even if the other couldn’t have smelled him, tasted his heat in the air, he would have been able to hear the thudding of his heart and his frantic panting.  

The ground underfoot was thin sharp sheets of ice that cracked and shattered under his weight, poking into the pads of his paws when they did, and exposing thick sucking mud underneath. It clung to his paws and legs, made it harder to move his already burning legs forward.

He didn’t know how long he’d been running. Just knew he’d started at sundown, that the alpha had started snapping at his heels shortly after that, and that he hadn’t dared slow down since.

He wasn’t sure if he was just making the chase worthwhile, making Eren work for him after everything that had happened, or really wanted to get away anymore. At first he’d felt almost playful, the joy that came with running working past the discomfort of being in heat and the thrill of the chase putting all of his senses on high alert, making them sing. But now...now it felt real.

Like he was really running.

He’d caught glimpses of Eren out there in the trees, glowing green eyes in the shadows, running along side him, could smell something sharp in his scent that made his fur rise and blood race in a way he wasn’t sure was good or bad. He thought maybe Eren was playing with him, letting him keep the chase going for his own amusement but could have snapped him up at any moment.

Or maybe Eren was corralling him, showing up just at the edges of his vision to make him scramble back and switch directions.

It wasn’t like the games they’d played when they’d be younger, not at all. Getting caught back then just meant teasing and some nips before starting the game again. Now however you were chased, you were caught, and then-

He yelped, skidding to a halt when a shadow pulled away from the darkness and barreled into him. He skidded through the ice and mud, tumbled down a small embankment.Things along the ground caught at his fur, snagging and tearing at him, and then there was a moment of freefalling when he hit the edge of the slope. His heart jumped into his throat; he landed a snow drift and, though the impact rattled him, he was unharmed. He hurried to get out of the drift, sneezing and shaking, then tumbled down the side onto the dirt and, he realized, right at Eren’s feet.

Eren smelled like rust and musk and sweat and something that made Armin’s legs weak and the heat in his belly he’d been doing such a good job at ignoring boil. He couldn’t help but notice, a panicked yip in his throat, that Eren was much larger than he used to be in this form. More width between his shoulders, body thick and muscled under the sleek dark brown fur, paws large-maybe twice the size of Armin’s- ears tall and muzzle wide.

He remembered when Eren had been little more than an awkward ball of fluff and milk teeth.

Eren’s mouth opened, showing rows of teeth, and he growled low in his throat. Armin scuttled back, managed two steps and then the alpha was on him, knocking him back again. There were teeth on his throat and nails pressing against the delicate skin of his belly, and he let out a breathy keening cry of fear.

Eren’s teeth pressed down. It wasn’t enough to break the skin but he could feel it through his fur, feel the sharp points digging into the skin along his neck.The smell of alpha was overwhelming, made his head swim as it flooded his senses and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to arch up or shrink back.

The shift back into his body came almost against his will, a tug behind his belly button, a blunting of his senses, and a fully body shudder and then he was on his back shivering as snow pressed against overheated flesh. He barely noticed it because Eren’s teeth were still on his neck, sharp and just a flinch away from piercing skin, and his paws were still on his stomach, claws scraping against him.

He didn’t dare move or breathe or even swallow, afraid of what would happen if he did.

He’d been so sure that Eren wouldn’t hurt him, had stormed out of Jean’s cabin furious at the very suggestion, but now he wasn’t sure. Eren certainly hadn’t been ‘gentle’ in his pursuit or, really, at all like he’s expected. He’d known the chase could do this to an alpha, drive the wolf to surface and put it firmly in control as the thrill of the hunt and proving they were strong and capable took over, and Jean had warned him but he hadn’t known this would be it.

He was shaking, and not from the cold. A noise, a soft begging whimper, broke the silence. He realized with a blink that it was him making the noise and that he was going limp under Eren, all the tension draining out of him.

His body knew what to do even if his mind was too frantic to grasp it. Back down, show that he’d been caught and would submit, be the good omega for the alpha, give in and present. He was the prey and he’d been caught; there was nothing left but giving himself over to the alpha who’d hunted him for whatever came next.

The alpha opened his mouth, releasing his neck, and moved his paws. Eren shuddered; his head fell forward as his body stretched and twisted against him. Fur gave way to skin, paws to hands. In the end Eren was between his thighs, belly hot and slick with sweat right over Armin’s half-hard cock. He didn’t stay there long, surging up as rough hands slid between his thighs and then under. Armin shouted, when he was levered up and flipped over so he was flat on his stomach, cheek in the dirt.

Eren’s scent was just as heavy out of his fur, thick in Armin’s nose, but there was something else to it that hadn’t been there before. Something animal and wild and on his tongue and he could barely keep himself from shaking apart under the weight of it. Something that made his nose twitch and the boiling heat inside of him spill over and drip out, turning the air sweet and heady as it mixed with Eren’s scent.

His hips were hauled up and thighs nudged apart to give Eren a spot to kneel behind him, so close their skin touched and the heat pouring off the alpha made him forget that he was on his knees in the snow with his face in a patch of dirt.

Armin closed his eyes when he felt Eren’s erection slide over him, leaving a sticky trail over his ass, before finding his entrance.  A shift, blunt pressure nudging forward and in, came just before a searing stretch that had his lungs tightening around a shout. He was dragged back as Eren pressed forward and opened him up what felt impossibly wide. The alpha didn’t let up, forced his way deeper and deeper into his slick soaked passage with hard thrusts until their hips were flush and Eren was able to bend forward to drape over his back.

He thought, frantically, that it he might be split in two or that he might burn up from the inside out. Eren felt big, too big, inside of him and too strange and it hurt. There were whispers of something in the back of his brain but he couldn’t make sense of them through the burning ache and the feeling of Eren in him.

An arm looped around his waist, keeping him in place as the alpha began to move inside of him. His eyes stung with tears and his fingers dug into the dirt, scrambling for something to ground himself. Eren took him roughly, dragging out as his gasped into his neck and rutting back in with short movements that sent sparks up his spine.

He bit his lip, unwilling to cry out.

He could take this. Had to. Needed to. He’d wanted Eren, wanted this.

Had he wanted this?

Did he still?

He wasn’t-

Eren’s hand smoothed up his side, over his ribs then over to his shoulders, between the blades, and up to tangle in his hair. Lips found his neck, pressed open mouthed over the just starting to swell scent gland then sucked. He jerked back and gasped wetly; it was like a trickle of cooling balm through his body. The approving rumble he felt from Eren made his head swim, some part of him content in the praise and the noises of pleasure his alpha was making.

When Eren’s knot started to swell, catching on his rim on the drag out and forcing him to stretch wider and wider on the push in, he writhed in something that wasn’t just pain. He groaned, dug his fingers in deeper and pushed his forehead into the dirt. Teeth pressed into him, not quite hard enough to break the skin but enough to spill more of that cool soothing feeling into his veins. He arched into the bite, hips tilting and driving him back over Eren’s knot and then he was shouting, howling, sobbing as the alpha spilled deep into him.

He put a hand over his mouth and bit down to stifle any other sounds.

\---

He didn’t remember falling asleep, or perhaps passing out, but he thought he dreamed about being picked up and carried while Eren, voice familiar even his dreams, whispered apologies against his ear and salty misery dripped over his skin.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter: Jean claws up some walls. And the floor. And Marco's back. Not necessarily in that order. (And not necessarily any of that at all. :P)
> 
> *breaks all the toys* 
> 
> This is actually the first part of the story I wrote (the chase) and I'd love to hear what people thought. I've been waiting to roll this out what feels like forever.


	9. The Bittersweet Between My Teeth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jean is a bundle of issues.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Uhhh. Violence, blood, heat sex...wolf things.

The cabin felt too small and much too hot, the scents of his parents permeating the air and making his head pound painfully. He could barely breathe without wanting to dig his nails into something or running away. Staying put, cross-legged on the floor with one of his sisters in his lap, felt like a near impossible task.

He wanted to be back in his cabin, his small space that he could keep as cool as he wanted and smelled only of him, but they did this before each of his heat cycles. It was really the only time he ventured into the home he’d grown up in; normally his mother would just walk about to see him if she wanted to but he couldn’t stand the thought of someone being in his space at the moment.

Everything they were doing was a series of familiar actions to accommodate his heats.

“You’ve always been so good with pups.” Jean looked away from his younger sisters to frown at his mother; he knew where this was going and he wasn’t in the mood. She noticed the look but it didn’t stop her from continuing. “I don’t know why that upsets you so much. You could be a fantastic father one day.”

He didn’t say anything. Instead he went back to finishing up the braid he was putting Lila’s hair in. Becca was scampering around them, occasionally jumping on Jean’s back and trying to climb her way up, little claws scraping at him. It wasn’t exactly the most pleasant thing but she wasn’t really trying to hurt him so he tolerated it.

It helped in it’s own way to focus on the twins instead of himself. When he was alone there was nothing but his impending heat; discomfort, overheated skin, that start of that constant ache, and deep bone gnawing rage. Everything in him was out of control, flaring up then going dim, sometimes brushing against things set sparks under his skin and sometimes everything was so dulled he felt almost numb. He alternated between hunger and everything that he considered eating making him sick to his stomach. He was tired but he couldn’t sleep for more than an hour or so at a time.

It was like his body was intent on rebelling against itself in every way it could.

He hated all of it. The lead up to his heat, the heat itself, trying to recover after.

“I’ve always said that. Petra used to go on and on about how good you were in the nursery before…”She trailed off with a grimace. She said as she checked the muffins she’d made for coolness. He smoothed a hand over the top of Lila’s head then stuck out his tongue when she tilted her head back to smile up at him. He knew what she was going to say, or rather wouldn’t be saying. She and his father tripped over the name of his former suitor like it was a curse word they didn’t want anyone else to hear; his father would always glare at him in frustration and his mother would make the face she was making now, a mixture of guilt and anger.

His father was still stuck on how things hadn’t worked out, blamed Jean for being unsuitable and for letting things end up so ‘out of control’, and his mother seemed to blame herself for how he had changed.

Jean knew she missed the son she’d had before: mouthy and stubborn but still someone she could understand easily. Someone who’d happily helped in the nursery and around the house and had thought a future with a caring mate where he was taken care of and round with child was what would bring him happiness.

She cleared her throat then returned her attention to the basket in front of her. “You’ll be twenty this year Jean. I’d been mated four years and was heavy with you by-”

“Mom.” He tied a ribbon around the bottom of Lila’s braid. It was a dark blue, a little tattered on the ends and smelling of cinnamon. Marco had left it, and a pale pink one, on his table the day after Jean had told him that his sisters were always after him to find them feathers and pretty stones to fashion into hair things.

He’d told himself he was going to take them, suspecting they must have once belonged to the sister’s Marco talked about, but in the end he’d grabbed them on his way out that morning. Lila and Becca had both looked like he’d brought them the moon and not second hand hair accessories. The need to take care of them, to see them safe and happy, was something he couldn’t shake. Not that he wanted to exactly but...it made things complicated.

“Jeanbo.” She said with an identical deadpan and the exasperated expression of a person who was about to delve into a well treaded argument.

Which it was.

He knew she meant well, she really did. She was happy with her life, spoke fondly of when he’d been younger and insisted that raising him had been the happiest time her life, and she wanted him to be happy too. She thought a mate and pups was what would do that, after all that was what made other omegas, including herself, happy.

That’s what everyone said anyway.

He gave Lila a little push and, once she was up, reached back to pry Becca off his back and drag the fluffball around. She shifted, going from tawny brown pup to a squirming child with a yip and a giggle.

His mother sighed, a stubborn look on her face he had the presence of mind to know was identical to the one he wore sometimes. “I was talking to Elder Shadis and, as it turns out, his youngest son is returning from helping build that new village in the south this year. Kenneth? He would be a lovely mate-”

“You know it’s not possible.” He didn’t snap at her like he would someone else, didn’t raise his voice or falter as he wove the strands of Becca’s hair together, but he tried to push how tired he was into his voice. They’d been doing this, having this same talk, for years and it just made him want to get up and find a place to sleep until the twins were old enough to find mates and his mother finally gave up on him.

Besides, he did remember Kenneth Shadis and, more to the point, nearly biting off the older beta’s tail when he’d pushed Connie into a mud pit when they were thirteen.

In hindsight Kenneth had probably been flirting with Connie in the way stupid young wolves tended to.

She sniffed. “I don’t know that and neither do you. Maybe a nice beta is what you need.”

He doubted he’d been any more tolerant of a beta than he was of alphas or omegas; it was true the only beta who’d been close to him when he was in heat was his father and that was a completely different issues, but he didn’t presume that somehow a beta mate would be the ‘magic’ his mother hoped.

Even now, a day or two out from his heat, he could feel the anger he couldn’t shake creeping up. Lila and Becca were about the only people he could stand touching him so close to his heat. He was edgy and anxious, all of his senses turned up too high and with no way to turn them back down, and even the usually calming scent of his mother made him grit his teeth.

He knew, logically, who she was but his instincts got confused, all jumbled up, and it was hard to pick out ‘carrier’ from ‘other omega’. In a day or two he wouldn’t be able to do even that.

The twins however didn’t bother him at all. The wolf inhaled their scent and, while there were the traces of immature omega there, it mostly registered then as tiny weak pups that needed to be cared for and watched over. He was always aware of where they were and what they were doing, eyes following them as they chased each other and wrestled, ready to jump in when they were too rough or made those soft noises unique to pups.

He didn’t know how far that extended, if in the worst part of his heat he would feel the same, and it wasn’t the sort of thing he was ever going to test out. Not with his sisters or anyone else's’ pups.

Jean didn’t understand why his mother couldn’t grasp that or, perhaps, pretended to not understand what the problem was.

“You could talk to him at least. He’s a very accomplished wolf and the Maria pack leader speaks of him highly.”

“I hope he finds a nice mate then.”  

“I also heard you were up at the lake.” The silken strands of Becca’s hair fell between his fingers. Pale amber eyes regarded him carefully. “With the alpha that came back with Grisha and Eren.”

He swallowed down the instinct to deny it; not only was it pointless and stupid but it wasn’t a surprise that they’d been seen. Marco had needed to go up to the lake to dig up roots to some bush and he’d claimed to not know the way so he’d dragged Jean along. He’d gone, mostly to get the alpha to stop whining at his window.

The lake was about a mile away, on the other side of the bridge that spanned the creek, and past where the bachelor alphas tended to set up. He hadn’t paid much mind to them but he’d expected to be seen.

It wasn’t as if they’d been doing anything out there aside from a few heated kisses exchanged before he’d decided rutting out in the dirt just wasn’t something he was interested in. But there hadn’t been anyone else around the actual lake just along the way, so he didn’t think they’d been seen then.

Had they?

No, if something like that had gotten back to his parents it was his father who would have been here talking to him, bemoaning how it was already hard enough finding someone who would consider a ‘rejected’ omega as a mate without him wandering around with an unmated alpha.

“I was helping him with something for Dr. Yeager.”

Her eyebrow went up. “Alone.”

He shrugged. “Why not alone?”

“You know why.” She was back to looking, and sounding, tired. The feeling was mutual. “You don’t have to make everything such a fight.”

He wanted to tell her that he wasn’t the one starting the fights but that in itself would just be another argument. He didn’t want to fight with her at all but that was how things always ended up.

He took a deep breath, groping for a semblance of calm that barely existed under the buzz of heat and anger, the released it. “What kind of muffins are those?”

She made a face at him but kept the conversation to dried fruit and nuts as he finished Becca’s braid, this time using the ribbon to thread through her hair instead of just to hold the end. He pushed himself up to his feet when he was done and raked his fingers through his hair. Becca practically threw herself at his leg, attaching to him like her hands were made of glue and refusing to be budged as he walked. Lila trailed after them, laughing.

The basket his mother had been working on, piled high with muffins, bread, and other things, was on the kitchen table. His mother had set it down then headed for the sink, working the water pump to fill up a bucket with water. She looked back at him but didn’t move to get any closer, well aware of how hard it was for him when he was like this.

“Bec, Lila, let your brother go so he can get home. Your father will be home soon and you both need to get cleaned up.” They whined, high pitched and sad, but did as they were told before rushing over to attach themselves to their mother instead.  

“Thanks for this.”

She nodded then pursed her lips, leaning heavily against the pump. He could read the tension in her and saw her fingers flexing. He took a step back before realizing her was doing it, putting more distance between them.

“Come by when you’re feeling better.” She reached down to put a hand on Lila’s head. “And don’t forget to eat. You’re always so skinny after your heat.”

He was rarely in any kind of state of mind to really care much about eating or drinking. He didn’t have many ‘lucid’ moments, alternating between the near painful hyper aroused ‘heat haze’ and the blank nothingness that existed beyond that.

Heat madness seemed like too mild a term for it in his opinion, too easy and simplistic for the feeling of going from one moment to the next and having everything in between be a blur of rage and pain and falling apart in his skin.

She was looking at him expectantly, waiting for him to reply. He forced himself to smile at her and nod. “I will.”  

He wouldn’t.

\---

“My heat's coming.” Was how he greeted Marco when the other man slipped into his cabin later that night. He was in the hammock in nothing but one of his longer shirts, miserable and sweaty and now that Marco was there, smelling nauseatingly wonderful and tempting, he felt like he might actually be sick.

He wasn’t sure it was a good idea for Marco to be in his cabin; it was causing a war inside of him already and he’d barely passed the threshold. He couldn’t choose between wanting to lash out at the invading presence in his territory, this alpha who came and went as if he had earned the right, and wave of sticky heat rolling in his stomach.

He knew his heat was pressing down on him faster than he’d expected it to and he regretted that he hadn’t told Marco before that he should stay away. They hadn’t talked about his impending heat at all and maybe he’d been a little busy just enjoying the chance to spend time with someone and not having to think about things.

Marco was a good distraction.

Jean wouldn’t go as far as to say he and Marco had been spending a lot of time together since he and Armin had stopped talking to each other but there had been a few nights where he’d let Marco in under the cover of darkness.

He wasn’t sure what the fuck he was doing with the other man. There was a thrill in doing something he knew he shouldn’t but there was also a sense that he was being stupidly childish by sneaking around like he was. What he’d thought was just going to be that once, especially after he’d woken up to find Marco had left him, had proven to be anything but. After he and Armin had fought it had been easy to let himself be tugged into Marco’s lap and kissed stupid and breathless. It had been nice and, most importantly, a distraction when he’d needed it.

After they’d laid around and talked haltingly about Armin and Eren. It had been cathartic, he hadn’t been able to complain about what idiots his friends were since Connie and Sasha had married Mikasa, and Marco has listened patiently before pointing out that they were both adults who could make their own choices.

Even bad ones. Even potentially harmful ones.

He wasn’t sure if Marco was right or wrong; a chase was dangerous if the alpha lost it and Eren was wholly capable of losing it but...maybe he was wrong. It was all too easy to picture Eren losing control but it was much harder to imagine him doing something to hurt Armin. Even when he’d seen Eren go too far, sink into his anger, it had been in defense of someone else not just because he was feral or something like that.

There wasn’t much he could do except let someone know what Armin was up to and that wasn’t something he thought he could do. Especially when he had no idea if Armin would go through with it or Eren would be interested or anything would go wrong…

He just didn’t know but what he did know was that if he told that the fallout would be considerable. Bringing that down on Armin for, potentially, no reason at a line that couldn’t be uncrossed.

But if something did happen and Armin was hurt it would be on him because he hadn’t stopped it.

There was no good answer and what he wanted was to not think about it, Marco was all too happy to keep distracting him. They fooled around, made out and touched eagerly, and sat around and talked. Marco was easy to speak to, made him laugh and got him to talk about things he wouldn’t have normally. There was something comforting in the fact that Marco was an outsider and didn’t have all the judgements and ideas in his head that everyone in the pack seemed to have.

“Was it supposed to be a secret?” Marco’s eyebrow went up as he pushed the door shut behind him. “Because it’s not a well kept one.”

Jean wanted to roll his eyes but all he could manage was a weak glare. Earlier, when he’d been in his parents cabin, he’d been annoyed but able to think and move around but over the course of the day things had rushed up on him.

The heat haze was usually a slow creeping thing, wedging in and then pushing the cracks ever wider until he eventually tipped over the edge. This time, however, it had gotten its hooks and then dragged him down to a point that he felt like his thoughts were covered in a heavy dark curtain in record time. It had slowed him down, made him feel dull and tired, and after some time moving things in his cabin around (putting the breakable things down in the inground pantry) he found himself too heavy limbed and foggy brained to finish the job. His head was pounding and he felt heat and pressure behind his eyes.

He’d stripped down to the shirt, everything else too rough and constricting, and then hit the hammock, sleeping fitfully on and off until he’d heard the sound of Marco crunching through the snow.

“I mean,” Marco smiled slightly. “You smell like sex.”

He was aware; no amount of wiping himself down or scented soaps could cut through the ‘omega in pre-heat’ smell and he’d given up on trying hours ago. It was sweet and damp and obvious, a clear signal to any potential mates, and he hated it.

He tossed a hand over his eyes. Keeping them open was making the pressure behind his eyes worse. It was dark outside and other than the faint glow from the stove there were no lights but everything still managed to be too sharp, too clear, too much.

“You look terrible Darlin’” Marco’s voice dropped to something soft and soothing. He could hear the alpha shuffling around, the sound of booted footsteps like a knife to his brain.

If Marco would see how miserable he was then why the hell was he there, making it worse? Why was he in his space like this, taunting him, twisting him up inside, and making it that much harder to think? He wanted to fight, was desperate to push the alpha no matter what it took, but Marco’s scent was even more tantalizing than it normally was, heady and perfect and he wanted to be touched, needed it.

“You can’t stay.” He pushed the words out through clenched teeth.

Marco hummed as he walked closer. “Water?”

He cracked open an eye to see that Marco was hovering over him, a cup of what he assumed was water in his hand. He closed his eye again, welcoming the darkness, and shook his head. His throat was dry but the effort required to sit up felt like it was beyond him.

A moment of silence and then Marco was touching him, wrapping him up and shifting him around. He cried out in protest; his skin was sensitive, too sensitive, and Marco’s hands were rough and calloused and warm. Marco slid in beside him, using his body to force him upright. It was dizzying for a moment; he almost slumped over and, honestly, would have prefered it.

The cup was pressed against his lips and, after some quiet urging, he opened his mouth to let the water splash into his mouth. It felt amazing on his tongue and trickling down his throat, cool and soothing against the burning heat instead of him.

He tipped over into Marco’s lap when the cup was emptied. “Need to leave.”

“Have you eaten something?”

“Are you ignoring me?”

“Sort of.” Fingers sank into his hair and rubbed over the scalp; he shivered under the touch. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to push up into the touch or flinch away. “Did I mention that you look terrible? Smells like you’re hurtin’ and you’ve barely started.”

“rough heats.” A thumb swiped over his scent gland then pressed down. He could feel that it was swollen but not to the point of hurting or making it hard to breathe yet. He felt himself relaxing, muscles slowly unwinding.

“Let me look after you. I promise to keep my hands to myself if that’s what you want.” Jean snorted. Marco’s hands were literally the least of his worries. “Just having an alpha around might make it easier for you.”

Jean sighed. Normally the idea that he needed an alpha for anything would piss him off but the need to fight was taking a back seat for the moment, falling away under Marco’s gentle petting. “You’ll regret it.”

\---

The first day wasn’t that bad. He felt sluggish and tired and horny, so fucking horny. He was hard and slick between his legs, so sensitive to touch that brushing against his shirt and brushing over his asshole with his fingers was enough to make him moan and his vision shake.

He didn’t do anything about it and, thought Marco was right there on the other side of the room he didn’t ask for help. He wanted to be taken and fucked until he couldn't remember his own name, know Marco would do it happily, but the idea of the alpha getting near him or even watching him take care of himself set his teeth on edge.

So he sat and listened to the brunette speak to him. He told stories in vivid detail, doing his best to paint pictures for Jean with his words.  

He felt like he could almost picture Marco’s family now: his sisters, his older brother, and parents and all the extended family who he claimed had always been so close you could trip over them at any moment. He wondered about what it was like to grow up like Marco had, constantly on the move, up and down the coast while the adults did odd jobs where they could find them, alongside humans more often than not.

He’d never even seen a human but Marco had been to all sorts of human cities, big and small, and even gone to a human school for a few years when his pack had tried a less nomadic life. Jinea, the closest thing Marco had to a ‘home’ was a human city and he still have some family who lived in a community on the outskirts. He talked about the city as warmly as he talked about his family, lips quirked up in a smile and accent deeper; Jean could tell he missed it all.

Maybe he was as much a distraction for Marco as the alpha was for him.

He went to sleep thinking that maybe having Marco around actually would help.

That was a mistake.

Everyone who knew Jean knew he had bad heats. What that meant could range from wolf to wolf and he found it easier to let them think it meant there was pain or that he was particularly ‘needy’ and being alone was abnormally rough as a result (which had been the case once so it wasn’t as if it was a complete lie.).

Basically anything beyond that he seemed to forget he was an omega, or maybe became overwhelmingly omega, and wanted to tear apart anyone who came close to his territory. That he got angry and aggressive and dangerous to be around, even to himself because without an outlet there wasn’t much to do but tear at the walls and himself.

He didn’t know of things had gotten worse because he’d gotten older or because what had happened with his first suitor had made some sort of alpha paranoia set in and blurred his instinct to mate, or maybe it was just his own unruly nature showing up in the wolf parts of himself. It didn’t really matter. The simple truth was he’d lunge at his own mother's throat if she poked her head into his cabin while he was in heat.

When he told people there was no mating, no family, in his future he meant it. A person would have to be insane, or like being hurt, to want to be anywhere near him.

Except he didn't think Marco was insane, just eccentric, stupid, and maybe had a healthy amount of alpha arrogance that made him think he could handle whatever it was Jean might be throwing at him.

The why didn’t matter much either and when Jean woke up in the middle of the night, or maybe early morning on the second day, he wasn’t really in a state for deep analysis anyway. He just knew there was an alpha in his space where there shouldn’t have been one, leaking arousal and something that made his gums tingle and stomach twist.

He shouldn’t have fallen out of the haze state so soon, but the moon was out and full, singing to him sweetly, and the cautious human in him had retreated under the combined onslaught of moon and heat with something like a huff of 'I told him so.’

Marco hadn’t moved, still standing by the hammock he’d fallen asleep in when Jean was still himself, not just anger and instinct in a human skin, and was watching him with one dark eye.

The eye widened in surprise when he unfolded from his crouch and jumped. His fingers dug into bare skin, felt it hot and firm under his nails, and he threw all of his weight onto the movement.  They hit the floor, the alpha underneath him, and he snarled and lunged, teeth bared.

He tasted skin and blood, heard the pained howl and then he was thrown back, tumbling over the floor, ears ringing. He wasn’t sure if the blood in his mouth was his or the alphas, maybe both. Didn’t care.

This was his territory, _his_ , and he wouldn’t let someone intrude on it. Wouldn’t let an alpha come here and take what was his or touch him when he was like this.

They clashed again. The alpha was saying something, calling his name, but all he heard was a rushing sound like the river in his ears. He bit and clawed and kicked; got tossed down and thrashed when the alpha tried to pin him, spitting and hissing, heart clenching up in something that smelled like fear to his nose.

The alpha was straddling his hips, one hand holding his wrist to the floor, and breathing hard above him. He tried to buck him off but strong thighs just to tightened around him.

His elbow caught the alpha in the nose and, past the thudding of his heart and the sound of blood in his ears, he heard a crunch. The hand pinning his other arm twitched away. It was only for a moment, a reflex, but it was enough for him to yank his wrist free and slash at the one good eye looking at him. The alpha reared back, avoiding it, and Jean planted his feet while rolling his hips. He got a little space, not much but enough, and a hard pushell against the alpha’s chest won him more. He scrambled back, nails biting into the floor, and just managed to get out from under the heavier body. Hands caught his ankle but a kick kept him loose.

He rolled to his feet, glaring.

“Fine then.” He heard the alpha say. There was blood on his teeth and face, dripping down from scratches on his chest and deep bite marks on his arms and neck.

He rushed him again but this time it was like slamming into a wall; the alpha barely moved at all. A hand wrapped around his neck and pushed  as a leg caught his and swept them from underneath him.

His back hit the ground hard enough to rattle his teeth, drive the air from his lungs, and make his vision jump as it dimmed around the edges. His wrists were caught and pinned together above his head; the alpha was on him again, astride his body and letting all of his weight settle on him. Rough fabric rasped over his erection and his entire body jerked at the sudden stimulation.  

He must have been going easy before because he was heavier this time; there was no room or leverage to try and slip away. Jean snarled again then felt the shift, the itching and rippling under his skin, and

The alpha ducked down in one smooth motion and teeth latched into his neck harshly. He yowled but then a hand covered his mouth. He twisted and writhed but ice was flowing through his blood, tramping down on the heat boiling inside of him.

He gasped then went still; he could at least dredge up enough sense to see fighting with teeth in his throat wasn’t going to work. The fight drained out of him as the ice bit in deeper and a different impulse hit him.

The need to submit was there, on the edge of things, trying to grab hold of him and he tried to push it away. He wouldn’t submit to anyone ever again, not now or ever.

But he was on his back, had fought and been put down, bitten into, and that meant the other was strong enough to be his alpha. Worthy of his submission.

Not like the other.

Marco let him go with a low warning growl. Jean could feel blood running down his neck and the metallic tang in the air mixed with sweat and anger and something that smelled like his heat but not exactly. He growled back but when Marco leaned in again he found himself stopping to hold his breath in anticipation of another bite.  

Marco’s tongue rasped over his throat, saliva stinging the wound as he lapped at it. Marco’s mouth was hot against his already heated skin, tongue rough, but he couldn’t do much more then try to flatten himself against the floor.

It was over soon enough and then Marco was breathing against his ear. “Rough heats and completely nuts are not the same thing.”  

Jean snapped his teeth in irritation.

The alpha laughed suddenly, moving the hand from Jean’s mouth up to push his hair back from his sweat soaked forehead. “Is it safe to let you up or do we need to keep fighting?”

Marco’s scent seemed to get stronger and the new heat-like scent spiked up over everything else, demanding his attention. What was that scent? Did he know it? Instead of the clinging syrupy sweetness of a heat, something that never failed to make him gag, it was bright and spicy, settling over his tongue and making his gums itch.

He breathed it in deeper, deliberately, and whined in the back of his throat. It wasn’t really that heavy yet, not like the thick honeyed scent Jean was putting out, but it was there nonetheless.

He didn’t want to like it, didn’t want to feel a surge of sticky warmth in his body, but arousal was there, warring with the rage. It made him dizzy, anger swimming with want and need and jumbling around making him unsure which was which.   

He really liked it.

Wanted to taste it, to have it.

He turned his head, tilted his chin, and found Marco’s lips with his own. There was no hesitation in the alpha’s response, a sharp nip and then his mouth was being plundered, copper and salt over his tongue. It was like they were fighting again, tangling tongues, slick sharp teeth, and wet gasping breathes, neither willing to let the other lead. He couldn’t breathe, didn’t care, felt lightheaded and hot and wet and

Marco let go of his wrists while pulling away from him with a punched out noise. “Shit. I think I’m-”

Jean reached out and yanked him back down, sealing their lips together and chasing away whatever was being said with his tongue. He pulled the alpha’s hair, heart leaping at the growl it earned him, and tried to grind up against Marco’s body. His hands slide down over the alpha’s back to find their way under his shirt and to press against skin. It was hot and sweat slick under his fingertips, yielded when he dug his nails in as he raked up over twitching sides and ribs.

Marco’s eye rounded then narrowed, the brown forced out to the edges as his pupils expanded. There was another shift in his scent, something smoky and sharp that made Jean’s heart thud harder against his ribs.

Marco’s clothes came off fast, shed with ruthless efficiency and tossed away before the alpha dropped back down on him, this time between his legs.

The feeling of hot skin and firm muscle pressing against his sensitive skin had him moaning and pressing himself up, greedy for more. He got it, Marco’s hands sliding over him as his mouth made it’s was down. He squirmed impatiently as he was scratched, bitten, and pinched, worked over until he could barely see past watering eyes and his bottom lip was raw from how often his teeth had driven into it.

When fingers prodded at his entrance his hips jerked, seeking more. Marco’s mouth was at his inner thigh, sucking what would probably be an ugly bruise over delicate skin, but he let go to stare up at him. A single finger pushed then slide in, Jean’s slickened passage accepting it easily. Marco’s finger pumped into him, crooking and rubbing him from the inside. Marco’s mouthed along his cock, sliding wetly up his shaft and then drawing him into the wet warmth of his mouth.

It was nice enough but not even close to what he wanted. He slid his leg up to press toes against Marco’s ribs, wordlessly communicating his impatience.

Marco laughed as a second finger joined the first. The thick digits slowly twisted in and out of him, curling to stroke over the bundle of nerves inside of him, making him gasp as his back bowed, then spreading apart to open him up more. Marco’s mouth slide down on his, drawing him in deeper, as his tongue glided along the bottom of his cock. He pressed into the alpha’s mouth then back onto his fingers, eyes sliding shut.

He rocked between the dual sensations, unable to decide between the dripping suction of Marco’s mouth and the fingers slowly opening him up. His thighs shook and his toes curled as he panted and twisted under Marco’s attention. It was good, so good, but not enough. The ache inside of him, the familiar boiling want, was there and he knew this wouldn’t do the job. Not this slow shallow touch inside of him; he needed-

“More.”

Marco released his cock with an obscene slurp, open mouth dripping threads of saliva. Swollen red lips curved into a smirk. “Greedy.”

Jean kicked the alpha, hard. Fingers pulled out of him fast enough to burn a little. Marco’s expression was one of confused outrage when he surged up to his knees and pushed Marco back.

If he wasn’t going to get along with it Jean would just do it himself.

It took some wrestling and wet plying kisses to get Marco onto his back so Jean could scramble up over him. He reached behind him to wrap a hand around Marco’s cock, hard and throbbing in his grasp. Marco made a noise, a laugh and a moan twined around each other.

“So greedy.”

He lifted up, positioning himself so Marco’s cock was pressing against his opening. He breathed in, held it, and then lowered himself. The blunt head of Marco’s cock pushed against the sensitive rim of his hole and then he was sliding past and into him. He had slick sliding down his inner thighs and, when he slid down down Marco’s cock, a squelching noise mingled with Jean’s breathy exhale and Marco’s groan. His shirt, rucked up when he’d been the one of his back, fell back into place to brush over his thighs. His cock was still wet with Marco’s spit and curved up towards his belly, leaking pearly beads of precum over the flushed head.

This was what he needed, to be opened up wide and to have an alpha, this alpha, hard and thick inside of him. It was satisfying in a way nothing else could be, all the parts of him seeming to sigh out their pleasure at once. The sense of ‘rightness’ was almost overwhelming, rose up in the back of his throat as a heavy lump and resonated in his core.

It was a uncomfortable, a lot of pressure and heat and the stretch, but he moved as soon as he was seated, chasing what his body was all but screaming for. Needed more, to be fucked open until he was wet and sloppy and knotted and bred. He could feel where Marco was thicker around the base of his dick and didn’t think he’d ever wanted something so badly.

He rolled his hips then rotated a little while sliding up Marco’s cock some. His hands flattened out over Marco’s chest as he brought himself back down. He shifted again, grinding down on Marco’s cock as he moved his hips in a slow circle. It pressed just right and he tilted his head back, mouth dropping open. Marco thrusted up, trying to meet his movements, and Jean narrowed his eyes while tightening his thighs around the alpha.

“Don’t.” He knew what he wanted and how to get it done. It would be easier that way.

Marco breathed in shakily, eyelashes fluttering, before nodding what Jean assumed was understanding. “Go ahead. Let me see you fuck yourself on my cock.”

He swallowed thickly, stomach clenching, then started to roll his hips faster, mimicking his previous motions to make sure Marco’s thick length glided over where he needed it. He bounced up and down on the alpha’s cock in short motions, never moving too far away, picking up speed quickly.

Marco’s lips parted to let low rumbling cures fall, sweet crooning about how wet he was and how good he felt, and his hands fluttered up over Jean’s thighs, like he intended to take hold, but ended up just resting there.

Each wet slide brought the alpha’s knot in and out of him, catching over his sensitive rim and sending ripples of pleasure up his spine. Slick was pushed out with every thrust back onto Marco, filthy wet noises and the sound of skin slapping against skin mingling with his moans and Marco’s labored breathing. He could feel that Marco was close, his knot starting to swell and getting harder to move on. His breathing caught in his lungs and then he broke, fingers finding purchase in Marco’s skin.

“Fuck fuck, alpha, knot me, fuck, want it **now**.” He’d been denied this, an alpha’s knot and seed, and it was so close now. He wanted it, needed it.

One of the hands on his thigh moved to grip his ass, squeezing and kneading, scraping over his skin and leaving tingling lines behind, but not doing anything to try and control his depth or speed. The other had went for his dick, pumping it firmly. Jean shouted as his orgasm swept him up, come spilling over Marco’s fist. The world faded, leaving him only with the sound of his own breathy whines and the feeling of Marco’s knot rapidly expanding inside of him. It hurt in the best way and he moaned as he slumped forward bonelessly, relishing in the way it filled him. The knot felt so big, huge and thick and _ohgoditwassogood_

Marco’s hips stuttered up, grinding his knot up into Jean who clenched around him, eagerly milking the other man’s cock. The alpha squeezed his ass harder and stammered out Jean’s name as hot come inside of him, filling him up more. Marco twitched, eye shut in a tight grimace as his continued to grind up against him. When Jean felt him starting to settle back he clenched down around the alpha’s knot.

“Fuck!” Marco’s body jerked and another spurt of come, hot and thick, spilled deep into him.

Marco swore again, low and drawn out, as Jean repeated the action. He was rewarded with another warm burst inside of him. He wanted to milk the alpha dry, to take everything he had to offer inside of him before the tie ended. Marco gripped his arm hard.

“I am really enjoying this desperate for my knot side but we’re going to be like this a little while so space that out some, please. You don’t have to drain me dry in first ten minutes.”

Jean blinked slowly, realizing with a start that the alpha didn’t seem to be in a hurry to get free of him or annoyed by his closeness. He was putting out waves of contentment and was looking up at him with a decidedly sleepy expression on his face. Jean felt a surge of purely omegan pride at seeing the alpha spent beneath him.

He let himself he crushed against the alpha’s chest and then rolled carefully so they were on their sides, face to face and breathing each other’s air. Marco rubbed at his back, small soothing circles, and kissed his slowly, careful of his swollen and bitten over lips.

Tiredness crept up and he drifted off.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would contend that Jean and Marco are damn near functional and healthy in comparison to Armin and Eren.


	10. Where Do All the Good Boys Go?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Armin and Eren are both fuck ups, in their own ways. (Also Jean should probably be kinder to himself. He's not actually in this chapter but...well. He should.)

Armin wanted, needed, his alpha. Needed him inside to badly it hurt, a pulsating radiating pain in his belly and lower, an ache in his cock that no amount of his own attention could fix, the open feeling his fingers couldn't sooth, the suffocating tightness in his throat.

Needed needed needed. 

He groaned, twisting himself around in the furs again then kicking them away, uncaring that he'd probably be cold and want them back soon. They were too harsh on his skin, felt like he was being rubbed raw and he was so hot, dripping sweat like he was dripping slick, wet and slippery everywhere, sticky with his own release, it was terrible. 

Where was his alpha? He had been there recently, Armin could smell him, taste him in the air. Could still feel him breaking him open, biting him-but not enough, hadn't broken the skin, hadn't done it it right why hadn't- needed it again.

He was burning up inside and outside. Why had he been left alone to suffer like this? It was so much worse now. His body knew what it had had and was screaming for more. 

He pushed his fingers deeper into himself as he pushed his face into the shirt he'd ripped off of himself when he'd woken up. It didn't help, even if he got off he'd be as hard as after the last time, but it was still better than just being empty and wanting. 

It wasn't his shirt, it reeked of earth and rust and alpha, and he wasn't sure if it was helping or making it worse. 

He wiggled a fourth finger in, eyes brimming with tears, and gripped his cock harder; it hurt, oversensitive and so hard the head was a deep angry purple. He jerked himself fast, huffing and crying into the shirt, and did his best to ride his fingers, to pretend it wasn't his hands doing the work. 

It didn't work and, as another orgasm started to creep up, he knew it would be unsatisfying and just make what he was lacking that much more apparent. 

Something creaked and a soft exhale made him pick his head up and look towards the door. 

Eren was a dark shadow just inside of his room door, hair hanging into eyes that were blown so wide they were almost completely black, mouth open, and hands curled tight around a steaming mug and a clay pitcher.

Everything smelled like alpha, especially with his nose deep in that shirt, but when he breathed in it was stronger, richer, intoxicating. He groaned, closing his eyes as he inhaled again, deeper, let it sit in his nose and lungs and mouth and

He let his hands fall away from his body as he spread his knees apart more, putting himself on display for the alpha’s eyes. He knew how he looked; skin flushed red, dick rock hard and dripping, hole spread open and slick, lips bitten over and eyes wet. 

Desperate. Needy. An omega slut gagging for cock. Like a whore who needed a knot so much he was crying for it. 

Didn't care as long as it got him what he needed.

“please.” His throat was dry and his scent glands were so swollen it hurt to talk or swallow; his voice was gravelly and strange to his ears. 

He couldn't remember it ever being this bad.

Eren took a deep breath then walked deeper into the room, kicking the door shut behind him. Armin's heart leapt in his chest. Finally, finally. He could smell how much the alpha wanted him, it was heavy in the air, teasing him. Eren was painfully slow about putting the pitcher down and coming over to his nest, the cup still in his hand.

“You need to drink this.” Eren sounded strained, voice high and thin, as he knelt carefully next to him. 

Armin looked at the cup then back at Eren, blinking slowly. “Touch me.”

Eren winced then shook his head; Armin's brow furrowed. What did he mean no? Eren wanted him, he knew it, and he wanted Eren and he was ready, so ready, wet and open and needed him. 

“I know you think you want me but if you weren't in heat you wouldn't even want to look at me.” Eren looked away and sadness tainted his otherwise mouthwatering scent. 

“It hurts.” He whined as he reached a slick drenched hand out to grab Eren's free hand. He tried to pull it, and the alpha, closer but Eren pulled back until Armin was forced to let go or be yanked out of his nest. 

Eren swallowed loudly and Armin could see his throat bobbing, see the way his eyes cut back to him for a moment before returning to stare at the wall.

“please.” He tried again. He rolled over so, instead of being propped up against furs and quilts he'd crammed into the corner of his nest he was on his hands and knees, staring up at Eren. “need you.”

Why was Eren doing this? Was he not asking right? Did he need to do something else? Present himself better? Had Eren not liked him on his back? Was this better? 

“Drink this.” Eren held the cup out, putting it between them like like a shield. “Or else you'll have to explain all of this to a pup in a few years.”

Armin shook his head then leaned closer and fisted a hand in Eren's shirt. He felt the alpha tense up but he didn't move or do anything but stare at him with wide eyes. “want you. want your pups. Always want.” 

He kissed Eren when he saw the alpha’s skeptical expression, tried to show him how much he wanted-everything he wanted everything- with lips and breath in case words weren't enough. When he pulled back Eren's eyes were shut tight, brows knit together, and he was breathing hard. 

He brought their mouths together again, let his tongue drift over the seam of the other man’s lips and tugged with his teeth, heart leaping at the throaty sound . He pushed at the cup with his other hand until Eren's fingers opened and it fell to the ground with a clatter, splashing its contents on the floor. He wrapped his fingers around Eren’s wrist and then time when he drew it towards him there was no resistance. He guided it down, between his legs and back to where he needed it most.

Eren sighed into his mouth. “Armin.” 

He sounded annoyed, exasperated, defeated and Armin wanted to lick his name out of the alpha's mouth. Tried to, dragging his tongue over teeth and feeling their sharpness, licking at Eren’s tongue, swallowing the alpha's breath. 

His kissing experience amounted to a few giggling exchanges with Connie (curious when they knew they weren't supposed to be.) and that had been dry, chaste but this was messy and wet and if he hadn’t already been on fire this would have done it. 

Two fingers pressed in, directed by his own hand, and he gasped, eyes slamming shut as he clenched around them. He felt and heard his alpha’s response: a broken off sound and a hitched breath and responded in kind. 

This too was better, so much better than his fingers had been, so different and good because it was Eren. It wasn't what he wanted but, as he held the alpha’s hand and eagerly fucked himself on thick fingers, it didn’t matter. His blood was hot, blazing as it raced through him, and his head felt strange and heavy as his vision and thoughts narrowed down to Eren and just Eren.  

He was shameless, rocking himself against Eren's hand and slick leaking out of him every time Eren’s fingers slide back into him, greedily devouring Eren’s mouth. He didn’t care that he was doing the work, that Eren was so perfectly still, couldn’t be embarrassed at his own need and actions. There was only Eren, his scent and the warmth of his body when Armin crowded closer, the tightening in his belly and the sloppy wet need inside of him.  

His cock throbbed and the wet heat between his legs ran heavier and thicker, coating Eren’s palm and dripping down around Armin’s fingers. Eren groaned against his lip then moved his face so his face was against his throat. His mouth, the little puffs of breath he was letting out, was a tease against his sensitive skin. 

“Alpha,” he gasped out when he sank down on Eren’s fingers just right, got them to brush against that sensitive spot inside of him and sent lightening up his spine. He was spiraling up, the heavy feeling in his stomach growing and pulling and he was close but it wasn’t going to be enough, he knew it wouldn’t. 

“Alpha.” He repeated, had it turn into a needy whine in the back of his throat 

He heard Eren say something, couldn’t quite track it, but then he was flat on his back, empty and shaking his head in frustration. He thought, as he looked up at Eren looking down at him while shoving his pants down, that he might cry or scream but then his legs were being pushed and Eren was between them. He was solid over him, his weight pressing him down into his nest, and it was bare skin against bare skin. One hand came down next to his head and the other snaked between them. 

Armin shivered while tilting his head back, trying to draw attention to where else he needed the alpha's touch. Eren nosed at his neck and then bit him, sank his teeth in almost gently; in the same breath he was rocked against and pressed into. 

He moaned Eren's name as his toes curled, pressed his hand under the alpha's shirt and tried to bring him closer. This, the pressure and warmth of Eren inside and the glide against sensitive nerves, the alpha on him, bracketing him, tonguing over his neck: this was how it was supposed to be. 

This was what he needed. 

It was slow, Eren’s hips rolling as he pushed in little by little, and then he was in deep. That, and the mouth working so carefully at his scent gland, were relief and added to the blaze inside of him all at once.  Armin’s hands moved, tried to find purchase and more skin to touch, but what he got was a hand catching one of his own, fingers interlocking as they came together again and again. Eren’s mouth left his neck, found his lips, kissed him hard, and called his name huskily. 

He blinked wetly, shuddered, and sank into it. 

\---

Armin woke up hot, aching, and confused.

He was between heat waves, a low point where he felt mostly normal but that was unusual. Being knotted was the only thing that could cause low points once a heat was really going, and judging by how everything smelled like cum and sweat and

Oh.

He could smell Eren everywhere, heady and calling to him like a siren’s song, but especially on himself. He was clean-someone had wiped him down-but he was so covered in alpha that he could barely smell himself under it. 

More awake and aware he could feel the dull throbbing in his neck, back, and backside and the soreness inside of him. Nothing too bad but heats were supposed to lessen those kinds of pains, making it possible for an omega to actually make it through up to a week of frantic mating, so who knew how bad it would be once the season had passed.

More thought brought back everything that had happened in sharp vivid detail. Eren chasing him, pushing him down an embankment, forcing him out of his fur, and then mounting him out in the dirt. Back inside, waking up sweat soaked and desperate, rejecting the heat tea, practically begging Eren to take care of him and throwing himself at the reluctant alpha over and over until he'd gotten what he wanted-Eren’s cock pushing into him, Eren's cum inside of him, Eren's teeth on his neck, Eren’s knot stretching him wide and fitting just right. 

Over and over. 

It was all just a haze of touch and need, his demands for more and Eren trying to keep his sated. He couldn’t get a real read on how long it had been, how many times he’d pulled Eren back into him.

Even now, with the need to have sex dampened, he felt himself getting slick just thinking about being with Eren and pressed his thighs together as if that would stop things. 

The fact that he also felt like he might throw up did very little to stop the simmering arousal in his belly. 

Speaking of a glance down found him stomach a little rounder than he recalled, like...well, like he’d been pumped full of cum a dozen or so times, milked his best friend completely dry, and only then had finally let up to rest. 

And never once accepted anything to drink, Eren’s best efforts be damned.

He was pretty sure he was going to be sick. 

How long had it been? A day? Two? Three? He was still in heat so it couldn’t have been that long, right? What had Marco told him? How many days was it okay to miss with the tea? Three? One? None? 

He'd messed up. He had messed up so badly and-

Something felt wrong. 

More wrong.

He looked around, trying to place what was causing the prickle of alarm creeping up his spine. He was in his bedroom, on his own fur pile, and early morning light was peeking through the drawn curtains. Nothing looked out of place at first glance; bookshelf in the corner, spillover books piled up on the floor, small table with its pitcher and bowl for water, chest that held his clothes and-

Eren. 

Tucked back in the furthest corner, a blanket tossed over him, sitting up with his head lulled to the side in sleep. He looked younger, face smooth, hair flopping over his closed eyes, mouth parted around soft puffs of air. 

Once upon a time Eren, and Mikasa, sleeping in his room was the norm, though never so far away. In Armin's bed and then, after Eren had gotten old enough that sharing a bed with him was ‘strange’, on the floor but always close enough that the distinction between in his bed and not was pretty arbitrary. 

After his parents and Eren's mother had died Eren had come back to the nest but it had been as far from sexual as it had been when they were younger and Mikasa had been in bed with them. 

He'd never retreated to a far corner like...like Armin was diseased or something. Hell, there had been times when they'd been pups and one of them was actually sick that they'd still insisted on puppy piles, swapping sickness back and forth much to their parents’ irritation. 

But this was different now, wasn't it? And he'd wanted different, he'd wanted it so badly he'd been willing to do whatever it took, but this wasn't what he'd wanted. Not Eren being afraid to be near him, not a head full of memories of pain and desperation.

He wasn't sure what was going to be harder, looking Eren in the eye or looking at himself. 

As if responding to his thoughts Eren's eyes snapped open. They were wide, confused and hazy, for a moment but when they fell on Armin they narrowed to dark pinpricks. 

Armin’s fingers tightened around the fur under them, something that was equal parts fear and heat making him shake. 

Then Eren shook his head and spoke, voice rough with sleep. “You ready to drink that heat tea now?”

Armin flushed, thinking about how he'd confessed to wanting Eren's pups, and...hesitated. The answer was yes, of course, that's why he had it, he knew what he had to do to make this work, he needed

Oh but the thought of not doing it, of carrying Eren’s children, warmed him in a way he couldn't deny, pushed right through the sick feeling swimming in his stomach. He knew it wasn't what could, or would, happen, and that it was very much influenced by his heat and the urge to breed, that it wasn’t necessarily all ‘him’ talkin. 

None of that stopped the idea from trying to take over.

Eren’s mouth pressed into a thin line. “Armin, you do not want this to be how you have pups. You should...something better. Someone better.”

“Better?” Armin echoed, hackles rising a little. 

What did Eren know about better anyway? Why didn’t anyone respect his choices, what he knew was right? Instead he was being sent off to someone he didn't know or care about hundreds of miles away apparently, as if that could actually be better. 

“Yes.” A shadow fell over Eren’s face, made him look hard and angry. “Someone who wouldn't hurt you and do what I did.”

Armin was shaking his head before he realized he was doing it. “That doesn't-”

“I held you down and I-” Eren's voice cracked; Armin's heart cracked with it. “You were crying and I heard you and I didn't stop. That's not...I lost control. I thought about someone else being out there, getting to you, and all I could think was that I needed to make sure if it was anyone that it was me, and only me. That you had to be  _ mine _ . Nothing else mattered.” 

His throat was so tight he doubted he could have said anything even if he could think of something. The places where he'd been bitten felt hot and his fingers itched to reach up and check to see if the skin had been broken. It hadn’t, he knew that he'd be able to tell if it had been, but what if? Eren’s scent was so overpowering, taking over everything, how would he be able to know if he smelled mated or not? 

Eren rubbed at his eyes, muttering something Armin couldn't hear then shrugged. 

“Besides, once I tell Erwin what happened I'll be lucky if I just get kicked off the pack grounds. If I'm really unlucky he'll tell Jean and then let him loose to rip my insides out.”

It took a serious effort to not stare at Eren like he'd lost his mind. “Tell Erwin? What?”

“I won't tell him about the chase. Just what I did. You won't get into trouble.” Eren looked painfully sincere and Armin realized with a start that all the fury in Eren's eyes was for the alpha himself. Eren wanted to...protect him? “He'll keep it quiet, I doubt anyone else will find out.”

“No!” That was the last thing he wanted, it was even worse than everyone knowing he'd been planning to sleep with Eren. At least then they'd both be in trouble, not just Eren, but like this...if Eren told Erwin he'd forced him he really would be lucky to just be cut out of the pack. “You can't do that. This is my fault.”

Eren's expression became that much more furious. “Don't say that. You didn’t make me chase you or...nothing I did is your fault.”

Armin stood up, ignoring the twinge of pain. He felt like he had to move, couldn't bare to sit still while Eren planned to ruin himself. This wasn't what was supposed to happen. Why was Eren doing this?

“But I wanted you to chase me. I wanted to spend my heat with you, I wanted- I want to be with-”

“I know.”

Armin stopped, the rest of what he’d been about to say dying on his lips. Instead he stared, eyes raking over the way the alpha’s shoulders hunched and the open guilt on his face, and his lungs felt painfully tight. 

“You know?” Eren’s face said ‘yes’ and suddenly Armin was sitting on the ground, knees giving out. “Did you know I’ve been in love with you? That I was turning down all those suitors and waiting...that I’ve been waiting for you all this time? To just...say something? To court me or tell me you weren’t interested or anything this entire time!” 

Eren flinched and that was all the answer he needed. 

“I don’t understand.” 

He really didn’t. He had told himself that Eren couldn’t possible know how he felt because if he had he would have said something. Even if he hadn’t been interested he would had told him that much, would never just leave him pinning and confused. Wouldn’t have sent him little gifts, things that made hope flare up, only to stay away and not send so much as a letter for months on end. Would have at least cared about him enough to be honest.

So he’d had to believe that Eren just didn’t know and that once he did know everything would turn out fine. 

But that was wrong. This was wrong. 

Jean was right. He didn’t know Eren at all. 

“I didn’t want to break the engagement at all, or leave with my dad, but it wasn’t like I got a say in it. After what happened with Jean-”

That made him look up, yanked him out of the haze of confusion. “What happened with Jean? Did you do something to Jean?” 

He was surprised at the surge of anger he felt; it was suddenly and white hot, enough that he felt the stirring of the wolf inside of him and they both agreed without question that if Eren had hurt Jean- Jean was pack, family, protected him. Eren was…

He didn’t know what Eren was. A part of him howled mate and something else hissed threat.

Eren was blank faced for a moment and then he jerked back, visibly surprised. “What? No! I-I can’t believe he never- no, no I can believe. Jean would curl up and bleed to death in his cabin before he told anyone that something was wrong with him. Did you know that he was being courted by some outside alpha? From the north, some guy his dad knew or found or scraped off the bottom of some rotten log, I don’t know.”

Armin squinted. He remembered some suitors but no one Jean had actually let court him. Jean had always been against the idea, hadn’t he? At least for as long as Armin had been of age, loudly deriding the idea of courting and most alphas in general.

“When?”

“I don’t know when it started but when I found out it was after...everything.” The way Eren’s eyes drifted to the side told Armin that he meant after what had happened to their parents. “I’d seen the guy a few times, coming out of Jean’s parents cabin when I knew his mom and dad were gone but I never really thought about it? Everything was already so messed up. I was so angry and on edge and no one could find any information about what had happened and you wouldn’t even get out bed. Caring about Jean just-he’s always looked after himself, right? He never needed me, or anyone, around like you did. And you needed me more than ever. 

“I forgot to be worried about Jean too.” Eren said it quietly, eyes focused on the ground, and Armin’s anger flickered and died. “I was here, with you, one night but you were asleep so I went out. Needed air, or space, or I can’t even remember. I didn’t want to be mad in front of you but I was so angry it was killing me. I was going by Jean’s parent’s cabin when I heard shouting. I guess that guy, the alpha, and Jean had been sleeping together or were going to or something, never could get Jean to really tell me what happened, but Jean had decided he wanted the guy to go. He was yelling something and then he got quiet, like he hadn’t been talking at all. I looked in the window and the guy was holding him by the back of his neck, had him pinned on the ground, saying some shit about how Jean was his and Jean’s dad had given him permission to do what he wanted.” 

Armin’s hands had curled into fists so tight his nails were cutting into his palm and he could smell blood; an ugly feeling he couldn’t identify was churning inside of him. Eren glanced up quickly then his eyes were back on the floor.

“I guess I busted in, almost took the door of the hinges, and started beating the guy. I don’t remember much. It was sort of like I was somewhere else, doing something else, and my body was doing what it wanted. I think I would have killed him and not- I wasn’t the wolf. I was like this, in my human skin, and I was going to beat him to death.” A quirk of his lips. “Except Jean started throwing shit at me and screaming about how no one was going to let me be with you if I killed someone.” 

Armin’s hands uncurled. “What?”

“There was probably other stuff first and I’m pretty sure he shifted and tore up my leg bad enough to scar, not that he’ll admit to it, but that’s what got through.” Eren shrugged. “It was a mess but Erwin got it all cleaned up quietly. He’s good at that. Jean’s suitor got something, I don’t know what, and kept his mouth shut. Jean’s dad tried to get me to apologize, but I wouldn’t. Jean might have, I don’t know but I hope he didn't. Either way the alpha wasn’t interested in Jean anymore; said he didn’t want a used omega with a crazy alpha so he went back where he came from.” 

He thought about the rumors that floated around about Jean, that he wasn’t untouched, and how there was never anyone who claimed to have slept with him even though so many people believed the rumor. Thought about how adamant Jean was about not finding a mate, how he could get downright violent if any of the bachelor alpha’s got too close or were too pushy with them-no, with him. He’d been slipping between Armin and interested alphas for years now, pushing them back with growls and quiet threats. Thought about Jean’s relationship with his father, how the other omega never spoke about the man when he talked about his mother and sisters. 

He’d never really thought much of any of it, the hows and whys.

Armin sucked in a breath as it became painfully clear that he'd messed up, had been messing up, on that front as well.

“Erwin told your grandfather and they decided that I couldn’t be trusted with you and ‘the future of the pack’ if I couldn’t manage to not beat someone to death.” Another shrug. “Broken engagement.”

Armin’s mouth dropped open. He wanted to push the words away but when hung in the air, terrible in their implication. That was why the engagement had been broken, not out of some misguided attempt to give him the ability to choose a mate? His grandfather had been lying to him all this time? And Erwin too? And Eren! Eren had been lying to him for years.

And Jean? Had he been spilling his every thought, sometimes crying in front of Jean while he wondered what he was doing wrong and why Eren had just vanished from his life, and Jean had known the entire time?

All of this because Eren had hurt someone who, as far as he could tell, deserved it? It was however many years later and Armin wanted to find that person and make them regret ever putting their hands on Jean, how dare they hurt his pack, that Eren had reacted ‘badly’ wasn’t...it wasn’t worth all this. Fighting for your pack was part of being a wolf.  

“You didn’t do anything wrong! If that alpha was-”

“I didn’t do it for Jean. I mean, I did, sure, but I didn’t hurt that alpha like I did for Jean. I did it because I was angry and wanted to hurt something and suddenly there was someone to hurt.” Eren tapped his fingers on the floor. “I’m still angry. I sit up some nights and just think about what I would do if I ever found out who killed my mom and your parents and the other wolves. I’ve gotten into fights I didn’t. Marco and I- Nevermind about that. But I thought maybe I was better. Under control. That I could come back and court your properly now.”

Armin knew what he was going to say next, could see the words forming on Eren’s lips and wanted so badly to tell him to stop because this was enough, it was perfect, it was everything he’d wanted to know that Eren wanted him. But the words stuck in his throat and Eren kept going. 

“But I hurt you, which is what Erwin and your grandfather were afraid of.” 

“I’m fine.”

Wasn’t he? 

“I’m not.” Eren whispered and started tapping again. “I knew I should have stayed inside, away from you, and I just couldn’t. Thinking about you with someone else made me so- I couldn’t take it and then you were out, running when I told you to stay and it was like you were saying you weren’t  _ mine _ , that I wasn’t  _ strong _ enough, and I needed-

“And none of that is a good enough excuse, ‘Mini, it’s not. I don’t want you to say it is, because I know it isn’t.” He pushed himself up to his feet as he spoke. “I’m going to make you some tea and then I’m going to go. You smell like the worst of your heat is over.”

Armin nodded jerkily; he felt like it was only a matter of time before he was an pathetic begging mess again, no where near like his heat might actually be breaking soon, but he wasn’t sure he wanted Eren to stay for it.

He’d done more than enough damage.

“okay.” 

It didn’t take long for Eren to do what he’d said, leaving Armin staring into a steaming mug and listening to the alpha open and then close the front door. He tilted the cup, watched the translucent liquid rise up towards the rim, and felt bile rise up the back of his throat. He dropped the cup and scrambled to his feet, barely making it to the bowl sitting next to the water pitcher before he vomited. When he was done he sat back down and pulled his knees up to his chest, trying to ignore that he was shaking.

So what now? 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Chapter: Armin and Jean make up. Jean wants to have some words with Eren. Armin wants to have some with Marco. Marco thinks Armin is sort of adorable. Like an annoying cat. (He doesn't say that, but trust me, that's what he's thinking.)


End file.
